Gender and Sexuality in the Classical Yugoslav Cinema, 1947–1962

Gender and Sexuality
in the Classical Yugoslav Cinema,
1947–1962
By
Nebojša Jovanović
Submitted to Central European University
Department of Gender Studies
CEU eTD Collection
In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy in Comparative Gender Studies
Supervisor:
Jasmina Lukić
Budapest, 2014
Declaration
I hereby declare that this dissertation contains no materials accepted for any other degree in any
other institutions and no materials previously written and/or published by another person, except
where appropriate acknowledgment is made in the form of bibliographical reference.
Nebojša Jovanović
CEU eTD Collection
-----------------------------------
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Abstract
This dissertation addresses the gender-and-sexuality-related motifs in the classical narrative
Yugoslav cinema in order to examine the gender order in the early Yugoslav socialist modernity.
It focuses on the fiction features films from 1947 to 1963, i.e. the period of the most intense
developments in Yugoslav cinema, from the very inception of the film industry in the postwar
country to the rise of the modernist tendencies, as exemplified by novi film in the 1960s.
The thesis strategically (1) uses gender-inflected conceptual and analytical framework,
and (2) proposes a new Foucauldian epistemology of Yugoslav cinema, in order to challenge the
dominant narratives about the socialist past, as articulated along the lines of the totalitarian
paradigm. According to the totalitarian accounts, Yugoslav cinema was primarily the instrument
of the Tito’s totalitarian regime run by the obedient propagandist drones. The classical Yugoslav
cinema was especially besmirched in the accounts: the films made before the novi film are
usually relegated to socialist-realist vehicles for disseminating communist dogmas and lies. This
study demonstrates the opposite: characterized by intense developments that cannot be reduced
to the stark ideological imperatives, the classical Yugoslav cinema actually testifies to a
polyphony of motifs and meanings – particularly those related to the gender-related aspects of
the “Yugoslav cultural revolution”.
Instead of going after an exhaustive scanning of the classical Yugoslav cinema, the study
opts to probe in-depth several specific groups of films by applying the gender optics. After the
introductory mapping of gender politics and cinema from the late 1940s to early 1960s, and
arguing for the new epistemological framework, the thesis showcases gender motifs in the three
major groups of classical films: the WWII/partisan films; the films about the post-war
reconstruction of the country; and the films about the vicissitudes of peasantry, with other
prominent groups of films also tangentially tackled.
Rich and complex, spearheaded by antagonisms and paradoxes, the classical Yugoslav
cinema actively participated in its vibrant socio-historical climate. Thus it needs to be vindicated
and more closely explored as the unique historical imaginary of the early Yugoslav socialist
modernity in general, and of the “apparatuses” of gender and sexuality in socialism in particular.
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Acknowledgments
I am profoundly indebted to Jasmina Lukić for what I can only describe as an unconditional
emotional support and intellectual guidance over these past years. From her brilliant theoretical
insights to the warm and caring attitude, she has been the most inspiring and reliable supervisor
and friend that I could wish for, her influence extending far beyond the confines of this study.
My education at Department of Gender Studies at Central European University gave me
access to unforgettable and galvanizing intellectual experience. For their invaluable support,
encouragement and friendship through the various stages of my studies, I want to thank Erzsébet
Barát, Éva Fodor, Francisca de Haan, Elissa Helms, Anna Loutfi, Eszter Timár, Mary Szécsényi
and Natasa Versegi. My gratitude extends to the Central European University in Budapest for
providing me with the perfect working conditions. The CEU Doctoral Research Support Grant
and Department of Women’s and Gender Studies at Rutgers University gave me the opportunity
and the time to research and write. A big heartfelt thanks goes to Mary Hawksworth and Phil
Alperson, for their kindness and hospitality.
I also thank to a number of friends and colleagues who aided me in a variety of ways:
Gaby Babić, Ajdin Bašić, Viktor Bertoncelj, Dario Bevanda, Dunja Blažević, Maja Bogojević,
Sezgin Boynik, Boris Buden, Gregor Bulc, Lilijana Burcar, Nejra Nuna Čengić, Ivan Čolović,
Branka Ćurčić, Ana Dević, Branislav Dimitrijević, Olga Dimitrijević, Rastislav Dinić, Franko
Dota, Milena Dravić, Puriša Djordjević, Howard Feinstein, Ljiljana Filipović, Vlatko Filipović,
Mira Furlan, Svetlana Gavrilović, Nikica Gilić, Dragan Golubović, Lejla Hodžić, Ana Hofman,
Jasmina Husanović, Dejan Ilić, Sebastian Jagielski, Miranda Jakiša, Renata Jambrešić Kirin,
Milan Jelić, Trevor L. Jockims, Vesna Jovanović, Slobodan Karamanić, Marija Katalinić,
Marina Katnić Bakaršić, Gal Kirn, Nerina Kocjančič, Ana Kolarić, Boro Kontić, Jelena
Kosanović, Maja Krajnc, Dinko Kreho, Petar Krelja, Dejan Kršić, Pavle Levi, Saša Madacki,
Vedrana Madžar, Bojana and Dušan Makavejev, Dragan Markovina, Marina Martić, Andrea
Matošević, Svebor Midžić, Borislav Mikulić, Zoran Milosavljević, Miodrag Milošević, Gorana
Mlinarević, Ivana Momčilović, Brane Mozetič, Matilda Mroz, Vedran Mujagić, Asim Mujkić,
Amir Muratović, Mustafa Mustafić, Eva Näripea, Tijana Okić, Elzbieta Ostrowska, Almira
Ousmanova, Srdjan Pavlović, Bojana Pejić, Sanjin Pejković, Jelena Petrović, Tatjana Petrović,
Ines Prica, Dara Pop Mitić, Ozren Pupovac, Tihana Pupovac, Damir Radić, Tatjana Rosić,
Renata Salecl, Aleksandra Sekulić, Reana Senjković, Tatjana Simeunović, Mima Simić, Svetlana
Slapšak, Branimir Stojanović, Tomislav Šakić, Irena Šentevska, Andrej Šprah, Marcel Štefančič,
Jr., Milica Tomić, Hrvoje Turković, Ivan Velisavljević, Branko Vučićević, Špela Zajec, Marko
Zubak, Alenka Zupančič, Želimir Žilnik, and the art collectives Kuda.org, Škart, and What, How
& for Whom (WHW).
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Nirman Moranjak Bamburać, Vera Mihić–Jolić, Marko Babac, Asaf Džanić, and Dejan
Kosanović – five of my precious colleagues and interlocutors – died during the course of my
research and the writing of the thesis. Their support, and the knowledge that they shared with me
remain the everlasting inspiration for my work.
I am grateful for the assistance of many wonderful archivists and librarians in the
following institutions: Arhiv Bosne i Hercegovine/Archive of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Center
for Human Rights Sarajevo, Historijski arhiv Sarajevo/Sarajevo Historical Archives,
Jugoslovenska kinoteka/Yugoslav Film Archive, Kinoteka Bosne i Hercegovine/National Film
Archive of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Media Centar Sarajevo, Narodna biblioteka Srbije/National
Library of Serbia, Slovenska kinoteka/Slovenian Cinematheque, and Slovenski filmski
center/Slovenian Film Centre.
Early versions of some parts of the thesis have been published as articles and a book
chapter. Some of the arguments on totalitarian paradigm and national imperative I have
developed in the articles published in Studies in Eastern European Cinema, KinoKultura, and
Hrvatski filmski ljetopis, whereas the preliminary arguments about the sexual apparatus of the
Yugoslav socialism are published in the 2013 volume Socijalizam na klupi: Jugoslavensko
društvo očima nove postjugoslavenske humanistike, edited by Lada Duraković and Andrea
Matošević. I am grateful to the editors of these journals and books for the opportunity to test my
work in progress within the scholarly forum of their publications.
My special thanks go to Katja Kahlina and Dušica Ristivojević, who were nothing less
than two of my guardian angels and sisters that I have found without losing them first. Damir
Arsenijević did not only read all my writings, but proofread and edited them; I am not sure
whether this makes him my accomplice or my victim, but I know that his comradeship is beyond
any appraisal.
Last and by no means least, nothing of this would have been possible without my family.
Hence my greatest debts are to Inga, my heart of hearts whose love and understanding sustain
me, to our Rudi, who literally grew up with this project and developed a passion for movies, to
my beloved parents Vida and Stojan, and to my dear mother-in-law Dubravka. I dedicate this
study to them, their love and, above all, their patience.
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Table of Contents
Declaration ...................................................................................................................................... i
Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... ii
Acknowledgments.........................................................................................................................iii
Table of Contents ........................................................................................................................... v
List of figures and tables .............................................................................................................viii
Chapter 1 Introduction: Screening gender in the classical Yugoslav cinema ........................ 1
1.1. Outlining the hypothesis ......................................................................................................... 1
1.2.
Mapping the 1947–1962 sequence ......................................................................................... 3
1.2.1.
The rise of the self-governing socialist democracy......................................................... 3
1.2.2
The gender order of the early Yugoslav socialism.......................................................... 6
1.2.3
The demise of the revolutionary heroine ........................................................................ 9
1.3.
The classical Yugoslav cinema ............................................................................................. 13
1.3.1.
The early classical period .............................................................................................. 13
1.3.2.
The rise and zenith of the classical style ....................................................................... 19
1.3.3.
The rise of the modern Yugoslav cinema ..................................................................... 24
1.3.4
The celluloid gender: The myth, the degradation, the subject ...................................... 28
1.4.
Toward the Yugoslav cultural revolution ............................................................................. 33
1.5.
The structure of the thesis ..................................................................................................... 37
Chapter 2 Towards a new epistemology of Yugoslav cinema ................................................ 41
2.1. Questioning the totalitarian model........................................................................................ 41
2.1.1.
Totalitarian cinema and the Cold War epistemology .................................................... 41
2.1.2.
The totalitarian model in the Yugoslav context ............................................................ 46
2.1.3.
The “de-Yugoslavization” of Yugoslav cinema and the totalitarian model ................. 47
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2.2.
A Foucauldian dismantling of the totalitarianism ................................................................ 50
2.2.1.
The totalitarian model as a “repression hypothesis” ..................................................... 50
2.2.2.
The Art pole of Yugoslav cinema ................................................................................. 51
2.2.3.
Differentiating the “black wave” .................................................................................. 55
2.3.
Gender apparatus in Yugoslav socialism .............................................................................. 58
2.3.1.
The totalitarian gender trouble ...................................................................................... 58
2.3.2.
Everything you always wanted to know about sex(ology) in Yugoslavia .................... 61
2.3.3.
The apparatus at work: Male homosexuality in Yugoslav sexology... ......................... 66
2.3.4
... and in cinema ............................................................................................................ 72
2.4.
Conclusion ............................................................................................................................ 74
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Chapter 3 Challenging the “great divide”: The gendered shades of the World War II/
Partisan films ............................................................................................................................... 77
3.1
Partisan films and the anti-leftist odium ............................................................................... 78
3.2
Homogenizing the WWII/partisan film ................................................................................ 80
3.3
The “great divide” fallacy ..................................................................................................... 83
3.4.
The partisan romance in the time of the revolutionary asceticism ....................................... 88
3.4.1.
Slavica ........................................................................................................................... 90
3.4.2.
On Our Own Land and Immortal Youth........................................................................ 92
3.4.3.
This People Shall Live................................................................................................... 94
3.4.4.
The Flag ........................................................................................................................ 99
3.5.
Vindicating the glamour .................................................................................................... 100
3.5.1.
Uncle Žvane ................................................................................................................ 105
3.5.2.
The Red Flower ........................................................................................................... 108
3.6.
Femininity as a mediating agency ...................................................................................... 111
3.6.1.
I Was Stronger ............................................................................................................ 112
3.6.2.
The Last Bridge ........................................................................................................... 114
3.7.
Familial troubles ................................................................................................................. 117
3.7.1.
Don’t Turn Round, Son and Under Suspicion............................................................. 117
3.7.2.
The “Kosovo westerns” of Žika Mitrović ................................................................... 122
3.8.
Conclusion .......................................................................................................................... 128
Chapter 4 How the love was tempered: Labour, romance, and gender asymmetry in the
construction cycle, 1948–1958 .................................................................................................. 131
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4.1.
The early classical period (1948–1950) .............................................................................. 132
4.2.1.
The Life is Ours ........................................................................................................... 133
4.2.2.
Story of a Factory ....................................................................................................... 138
4.2.3.
Lake and Blue 9 ........................................................................................................... 141
4.2.
The mature classical period (1957–1958)........................................................................... 148
4.2.1.
It Was Not in Vain and Zenica .................................................................................... 149
4.2.2.
On That Night.............................................................................................................. 152
4.2.3.
Only Human ................................................................................................................ 155
4.2.4.
Section B ..................................................................................................................... 165
4.3.
The erasure of labour and the rise of the consumerist spectacle ........................................ 168
4.4.
Conclusion .......................................................................................................................... 178
Chapter 5 Confronting the rural patriarchy: Celluloid peasantry from the monarchist to
the socialist Yugoslavia ............................................................................................................. 180
5.1 .
Peasantry and gender in the interwar period-set films........................................................ 181
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5.1.1.
Stone Horizons ............................................................................................................ 182
5.1.2.
The Girl and the Oak .................................................................................................. 188
5.1.3.
Master of One’s Own Body ......................................................................................... 197
5.2.
Legacy of the rural patriarchy in the socialism-set films.................................................... 203
5.2.1.
Train without a Time Table ......................................................................................... 206
5.2.2.
Boom Town ................................................................................................................. 211
5.2.3.
The Superfluous One ................................................................................................... 218
5.3.
Conclusion .......................................................................................................................... 225
Chapter 6 Conclusion .............................................................................................................. 228
Appendix A filmography of the Yugoslav feature films, 1947–1962 ................................... 231
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References .................................................................................................................................. 254
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List of figures and tables
FIGURE 1.1–2 Early classical style: Slavica (1947) ................................................................................... 16
TABLE 1.1 The ratio of the WWII/partisan, historical, and the socialism-set films ................................... 17
TABLE 1.2 The number of feature films during the era of the classical Yugoslav cinema ......................... 20
FIGURE 1.3 Mature classical style: The Doors Remain Open (1959)......................................................... 22
FIGURE 1.4 The celluloid estrada: Velika turneja/The Grand Tour (1961) ............................................... 25
FIGURE 2.1 Yugoslav sexologist Aleksandar Kostić in Love Affair (1967) ............................................... 62
FIGURE 3.1–4 Marital bliss vanishes in a single shot in Slavica (1947) .................................................... 91
FIGURE 3.5–6 The mother’s ultimate lesson in Slavica (1947).................................................................. 92
FIGURE 3.7–10 The death of Slavica ......................................................................................................... 95
FIGURE 3.11–12 The death of Jagoda in This People Shall Live (1948).................................................... 95
FIGURE 3.13–14 The female ensembles and masses in This People Shall Live ......................................... 98
FIGURE 3.15–16 Ritual unraveling of the women’s hair in This People Shall Live ................................... 98
FIGURE 3.17–20 Marija breaks down under Vuksan’s piercing gaze in The Flag................................... 100
FIGURE 3.21–22 The bourgeois nightlife in Slavica ................................................................................ 102
FIGURE 3.23–24 The female collaborationists in Slavica ........................................................................ 102
FIGURE 3.25–28 The ustaša bacchanalias in The Flag ............................................................................ 103
FIGURE 3.29–30 The women collaborationists in Immoral Youth ........................................................... 104
FIGURE 3.31–32 The tap dancer in Immortal Youth................................................................................. 104
FIGURE 3.33–34 Ninetta saves Žvane from Rostner in Uncle Žvane ....................................................... 105
FIGURE 3.35–38 Nineta seduces the Nazi soldiers, and leaves after Fritz in Uncle Žvane ...................... 106
FIGURE 3.39–42 The socialist-realist glamour: Nineta as diva in Uncle Žvane ....................................... 107
FIGURE 3.43–46 The revolutionary cross-dresser in Red Flower ............................................................ 109
FIGURE 3.47–50 Zora’s shifting allegiances ............................................................................................ 113
FIGURE 4.1–2 Mara and Slobodan in The Life is Ours ............................................................................ 135
FIGURE 4.3–4 Milan and Stana in The Life is Ours.................................................................................. 136
FIGURE 4.5–6 The triumphant camaraderie in the ending of The Life is Ours ........................................ 137
FIGURE 4.7–8 The obliquely rendered kiss in the last shots of Lake........................................................ 143
FIGURE 4.9–12 The failed kiss, and Pjero’s shame in the ending of Blue 9 ............................................ 146
FIGURE 4.13–14 The happily-ever-after kiss in Miraculous Sword......................................................... 148
FIGURE 4.15–16 From discord to harmony: Jure with Vera (left), and with Bojka ................................. 150
FIGURE 4.17–20 Divna roams the factory and makes up with Boro in Zenica ........................................ 152
FIGURE 4.21–22 The love triangle at the workplace in On That Night .................................................... 154
FIGURE 4.23–26 Marija fails to act and melodramatically runs away from the plant .............................. 155
FIGURE 4.27–28 The feminine lethargy in Only Human ......................................................................... 156
FIGURE 4.29–32 The ecstatic finale of Only Human ............................................................................... 157
FIGURE 4.33–34 Love under the gaze of the big Other............................................................................ 159
FIGURE 4.35–36 The masculine insecurity and self-pity in Only Human ................................................ 160
FIGURE 4.37–38 The handicapped man facing his lack in I Will Be Back ............................................... 162
FIGURE 4.39–42 The scenes from the loveless marriage in I Will Be Back ............................................. 162
FIGURE 4.43–46 Jana’s voluntarily blindness and isolation..................................................................... 164
FIGURE 4.47–48 The couple of working buddies in Section B ................................................................ 165
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FIGURE 4.49–52 Where the men see the fruits of hard labour, the women see merely dirt ..................... 167
FIGURE 4.53–54 The spectacle of labour in Section B ............................................................................. 175
FIGURE 4.55–56 The spectacle of estrada in It is Better to Know How .................................................. 176
FIGURE 4.57–58 The spectacle of sex in It is Better to Know How ......................................................... 176
FIGURE 5.1–2 The ending of Stone Horizons........................................................................................... 183
FIGURE 5.3–4 Ema’s breakdown in the finale of Concert ....................................................................... 188
FIGURE 5.5–6 Calvary in The Girl and the Oak....................................................................................... 190
FIGURE 5.7–9 The gradual denuding of the female body ........................................................................ 192
FIGURE 5.10–11 Christian symbols in The Girl and the Oak .................................................................. 194
FIGURE 5.12 Bojan reaches for Smilja’s breast ....................................................................................... 194
FIGURE 5.13–16 The stylized framing and the mise-en-scène ................................................................. 195
FIGURE 5.17–18 The human figures diminished by the landscape .......................................................... 195
FIGURE 5.19–20 The extreme close-ups .................................................................................................. 196
FIGURE 5.21–22 Smilja as Madonna........................................................................................................ 196
FIGURE 5.23–24 Roža discovers her own eroticism in Master of One’s Own Body................................ 199
FIGURE 5.25–26 The wedding in the barn and the lonely Roža ............................................................... 203
FIGURE 5.27–32 The self-aware bodily display in The Year Long Road................................................. 206
FIGURE 5.33–34 Dana’s parents fight over her rights .............................................................................. 208
FIGURE 5.35–38 Ike and Nikolica share a farewell kiss; Lovre arrives as Nikolica leaves ..................... 209
FIGURE 5.39–40 Nikolica suffers a mental breakdown that resembles “the partisan disease” ................ 211
FIGURE 5.41–42 Mikajilo is trying to get away from Ranka .................................................................. 219
FIGURE 5.43–44 Mikajilo stuck in-between the Village and the City (left); Ranka sings ....................... 221
FIGURE 5.45–50 The elusive ending of The Superfluous One ................................................................. 224
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Chapter 1
Introduction: Screening gender in the classical Yugoslav cinema
1.1.
Outlining the hypothesis
This thesis posits Yugoslav cinema as the royal path for gender-inflected examination of the
early stages of the socialist modernity. Drawing upon one of the fundamentals of the feminist
film scholarship, I assume that cinema – as one of the privileged fields of cultural production and
consumption in the 20th century modernity – imbues its own socio-political context with ever
new and shifting gender plots and images, both propelling and challenging many ideas, fantasies,
values, and norms. Yugoslav cinema was not exception to this. It provided the public imaginary
of the Yugoslav socialist modernity with a sprawling plethora of: the celluloid femininities and
masculinities, in which gender alloyed with class, location, age, and ethnicity; the plots and
images of heterosexual coupling, which posited its normative status both through of the happilyever-after unions, and through the respective counter-images of fatal, obscene and failed
romantic liaisons; the designations of homosexuality and other types of queerness; a neverending stream of narratives of kinship, family, and marriage, as the historically shifting, yet ever
fundamental, social tenets; etc.
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The thesis specifically explores some of these motifs in relation to the classical Yugoslav
cinema, which I here define, at its most elemental, as the fiction feature films from the postWorld War II beginnings of Yugoslav feature film production in the late 1940s, to the rise of the
“new (Yugoslav) film [novi (jugoslavenski) film]” in the early 1960s. Generally, I treat these
films as the complex social documents that testify in a salient way on how gender was conducted
and interwoven in the intense post-war developments in Yugoslavia and its variant of socialism.
Relying on the contemporary theories of ideology and social relations, I propose that we should
approach the gender order of the early socialist modernity by means of their ambiguities and
1
contradictions: as the privileged historical imaginary of the Yugoslav socialism, cinema reveals
many antagonisms underlying and informing the gender regimes of the socialist Yugoslavia.1
I shape the gist of my thesis by critically addressing what I label the “anti-Yugoslav
backlash”: the vantage that posits the socialist Yugoslavia as the totalitarian state and thus
innately malign and anti-modern socio-political project.2 I oppose that backlash narrative by
siding with the view that sees the Yugoslav socialism as “a typical enlightening, modernization
structure that to a great extent continued the democratic cultural processes initiated during the
second half of the 19th century, [while at the same time was] not free of accumulating
contradictions and ambivalent outcomes” (Duda, 2011, p. 254). More to the point, we should not
see these contradictions and inconsistencies as epiphenomenal to the Yugoslav socialist
enterprise, but as integral to it.3
Accordingly, the premise of the thesis is that the gender issues in the socialist
Yugoslavia cannot be relegated to function or expression of some presupposed totalitarian
essence or logic. Instead, we should see them as the fundamental elements of the socialist
modernity in all its major and intertwined dimensions: social, political, economic, and cultural.
Focusing on the cultural dimension of the Yugoslav socialism, I will rephrase my thesis: the
Yugoslav cinema testifies that gender order was subject of constant change and re-articulation,
shaped by the social factors many of which cannot be reduced to some supposedly communist
features. These gender-related changes, antagonisms, and ambiguities illustrate that Yugoslav
socialism, a far cry from being a totalitarian blind alley of the 20th century, fully belonged to the
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global gender and sexual modernity.
1
For the concept of “historical imaginary”, see Elsaesser (2000). The concepts of gender regime and gender
order we owe to Connell (1987, pp. 119–142).
2
In that sense, anti-Yugoslav backlash recycles the gist of the Cold War “modernization theory” that equates
modernity with capitalism. For the critical accounts of the modernization theory, see Latham (2000), and Gilman
(2003).
3
For example, Sabrina P. Ramet argues that although the Yugoslav socialism – “the Titoist system”, as she
would have it – was famous for its contradictions, to “speak of [them] is not to speak of the nature of the system,
only to say something of its spirit” (1999, pp. 90–91). I find the dichotomy between “nature” and “spirit”, the two
essentialist concepts, highly problematic and inadequate in this context.
2
1.2.
Mapping the 1947–1962 sequence
The period from the late 1940s to the early 1960 was arguably one of the strongest torrents and
the most dazzling meanderings in the history of socialist Yugoslavia, and thus offering a plenty
of evidence of the complexity of the Yugoslav socialist modernity. As the thesis will tackle those
complexities through the gender-focused analyses of the specific classical Yugoslav films, I will
first provide a threefold blueprint of the period within which those films were made and to which
they contributed. As a synoptic account like this cannot do justice to such a dynamic historical
sequence, I will only punctuate its turning points and main tendencies with regard to, first, the
general socio-political and economical context, then in relation to gender order, and, last but not
least, in relation to developments in cinema.
1.2.1. The rise of the self-governing socialist democracy
The defining tendency of the early post-World War II Yugoslavia was a massive attempt to
recover from the devastating war-inflicted losses. The Yugoslav communists, who had tempered
the new Yugoslav state during WWII, by combining both antifascist struggle and communist
revolution, unambiguously designated the country’s future as a socialist one, modeling it after
the Soviet template. A member of the Communist Information Bureau (Cominform) and the
Soviet Union’s most reliable ally, Yugoslavia was a showcase example of centralized,
bureaucracy-suffused state-socialism.
When Stalin excluded Yugoslavia from Cominform in June 1948, threatening the country
with economic starvation and political isolation, Tito and the communist party turned to the West
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for help. In a relatively short time, the Yugoslav Soviet-style socialism had become “socialism
on American wheat” (Jakovina, 2002).4 And yet, it was socialism none the less. Ousted from
Eastern bloc, Yugoslavia’s leaders did not give up on the revolutionary principles of Marxism
and socialism, but accused Stalin of perverting them. In a remarkable attempt to differentiate
themselves from the Stalinist doctrine, the Yugoslav ideologues redesigned both their socialist
4
Tvrtko Jakovina argues that the American aid to Yugoslavia (2.2 billion dollars in goods and military from
1950 to mid-1960s) was substantial in preserving Tito’s independence from Moscow: “Yugoslavia was like a Trojan
horse of the West, incessantly demonstrating to the East that progress was possible. American policy supported the
evolution of the Yugoslav system towards decentralisation and humanisation of international affairs, which
demanded better connections between Yugoslavia and the West” (2011, p. 21).
3
theory and practice, coming up with a key concept of the new stage of Yugoslav socialism: the
workers’ self-management or self-governing.
Since this account cannot but merely scratch the concept and phenomenon as complex,
dynamic and intricate as self-management,5 let me outline it by borrowing from a source that can
hardly be accused for pro-socialist bias. It is a 1975 World Bank report:
The Yugoslavs began to evolve a new economic system in 1950. It represents more than just a
reaction to the inefficiencies and weaknesses of the centrally administered Soviet-type economy
of the early post-war years. It marks a search for a new kind of socialist society. The system is
characterized by social ownership and control of the means of production, with workers’ selfmanagement and the decentralization of political and economic decisions. As a corollary of
decentralized decision making there is a greater reliance on markets as a guide to the allocation of
resources, and gradual reduction of centralized planning and control. The evolution of the system
has been characterized by a pragmatic, experimental and relatively nondogmatic approach. [...]
The Yugoslavs have been groping to translate their notion of a self-managed socialist democracy
into practice, and the evolution of the system is still far from complete. It has been marked by
discontinuities – periods of rapid change (e.g. in 1953, 1961, 1965 and 1971) have been followed
by periods of consolidation. Increased economic efficiency has been one of the major objectives
of the process of institutional change.
(Dubey, 1975, p. 1)
The law on self-management passed in 1950, transferring the management of the previously
state-owned factories, hospitals, schools and other “work organizations”, to their respective
employees (“workers’ councils”). The history of the Yugoslav self-governing socialism was one
of the ongoing reform, experiment, and contestation, but there is a broad consensus on its overall
positive effects in the period in question: it substantially contributed to the post-war recovery and
enabled the well-being of a significant part of Yugoslav population. Or, to put it in the language
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of the World Bank statistics: “Real gross domestic product (GDP) growth during 1950–71
averaged about 6 percent per year, and per capita income in constant prices increased by about
two and one-half times during the period. Development was characterized by rapid structural
change, a fairly high rate of employment growth, and, particularly since 1965, rapid growth of
output per worker and rising standards of living” (Dubey, 1975, p. 3).6
5
For an exemplary collection of scholarship on the self-management from the contemporary era, see Horvat,
Marković and Supek (1975). The most comprehensive post-socialist study on the Yugoslav economy and selfmanagement, see Woodward (1995); for the more recent accounts, see Kirn (2010) and Suvin (2014).
6
Virtually all major authors who did not succumb to the totalitarian model, support the consensual view that the
Yugoslav society generally benefited from the self-management reforms, at least by the mid-1960s, e.g. Duda
(2010), Jakovina (2011), Jović (2012), Kirn (2010), and Suvin (2014).
4
A detail that begs to be emphasized is the fact that the self-management effectively
introduced the market economy:
in contrast to the etatist and centralist (Soviet) model, in this model [the social] needs will not be
defined “from above” by central directives of the Party and the state, but by the play of the
market and of the demands that emerge from it. If one remembers that it is socialist enterprises,
and not private owners, that are confronting each other on this market, then one cannot consider
this market economy a capitalist economy.
(Garaudy, 1975, p. 33, original emphasis)
Dejan Kršić argues that already the 1950s vividly testified that the Yugoslav self-governing
system “was in its essence also a market-oriented consumer society” (2011, p. 237), and
illustrates it with a telling detail. The year 1953 was the last year of the post-war supply rationing
– a paradigmatic remainder of both the post-war scarcity and of the state-planned economy – and
at the same time the year of one of the very first large advertising campaigns in Yugoslavia: the
promotion of the new, domestically produced soft drink Cockta (or the so-called Yugo-cola) was
launched at the ski jumping competition at Planica. By the early 1960s, similar campaigns would
be the paint-by-numbers affairs. The mass media, popular culture, advertisements, brands, and
Edmund Stillman depicted Yugoslavia as “not only history’s first example of an affluent (or ate
least semi-affluent) Marxist society; it is also the first self-proclaimed socialist state to pursue
policies which seek to promote the material and immaterial satisfactions of the individual rather
that to achieve a purely collective well-being” (quoted in Dimitrijević, 2012). His image of the
Yugoslav success foregorunded the country’s economical and, most importantly, cultural ties
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with the West:
Tens of thousand of Yugoslav citizens visit abroad – either for pleasure or to work for better
wages in Italy, Austria or West Germany. The intellectual young of the coutry study abroad, and
even when they do not, they are fully conversant with the work of avant-garde Western writers,
artists and film directors. It is possible to purchase the latest outrage perpetrated by Elvis Presley
or the Beatles; the Yugoslavs themselves play assiduous jazz. In the remote mountain villages of
Bosnia and Montenegro, peasant children perform the obsessive ritual of the hula-hoop only a
few years out of date. The country manufactures Italian Fiat 600s and sells them—on the
installment plan—to tired Party bureaucrats whose goading wives talk now of their “little
dressmakers”, buy cake mixes in supermarkets and gossip when they meet at the theater.
(Stillman, quoted in Dimitrijević, 2012)
5
Stillmans account thus offers in nuce the image of a society that attempted combining “the world
of production” and “the word of consumption” (Jambrešić Kirin & Blagaić, 2013, p. 59), or “the
utopia of production” and “the consumerist utopia” (Dimitrijević, 2012).
1.2.2 The gender order of the early Yugoslav socialism
The gender equality was one of the cornerstones of the Yugoslav communists’ socio-political
edifice. For them, it held that status already before the war, and as early as 1942 they introduced
it in their provisional rules and regulations that were in effect in the regions that they had
liberated. Immediately after the war, the first Yugoslav Constitution of 1946 has promulgated:
“The women are equal with the men in all areas of the state, economic and social life. For the
equal work the women have right to the equal wage as the men, and are enjoy special protection
in the workplace. The state specifically protects the interests of the mother and the child. [Žene
su ravnopravne sa muškarcima u svim oblastima državnog, privrednog i društvenog života. Za
jednak rad žene imaju pravo na jednaku platu kao i muškarci i uživaju posebnu zaštitu u radnom
odnosu. Država naročito štiti interese majke i djeteta]” (quoted in Milišić, 1999, p. 231).
In legal terms, the shift from the pre-war gender order to the socialist one was not only
revolutionary but epochal. Consider, for example, the status of marriage in the two Yugoslav
states. In the monarchy, the marriage was under the jurisdiction of the many churches that
differed in their values, rules, and customs – save one point, that is: they all subjugated the wife
to the husband as the supreme instance of the marital/familial domain (paternal rule); in some
cases divorce was unacceptable, whereas in the cases when it was allowed the divorced women
might have been prevented for remarrying; the marriage was usually restricted to the one
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confession or ethnicity; the children born out of wedlock did not have the same rights as those
born in a marital union; the Islam community allowed for polygamy; etc. (Mladenović, 1963, pp.
178–182) In one of the most egregious illustrations of women’s marital subjugation, a legal act
promulgated that wives have the same legal status as “minors, scoundrels, profligates, mentally
deranged, and over-indebted persons who face bankruptcy [maloljetnici, propalice, raspikuće,
osobe lišene uma, i prezaduženici stavljeni pred stečaj]” (quoted in Sklevicky, 1996, p. 90). After
the war, however, also in 1946, the socialist legislative redefined the marriage as a mandatory
civil affair. Every citizen of age could get merry on her or his own will, with the person of the
opposite sex who would voluntarily accept the arrangement, just as they could freely divorce, on
6
the demand of at least one spouse. The principle of gender equality was fundamental to marriage
in socialism: the wife could keep her maiden surname, she had the same rights to the joint
property and inheritance, and, in general, “all that [was] allowed to the husband, [was] also
allowed to the wife [što je slobodno mužu, slobodno je i ženi]” (quoted in Sklevicky, 1996, p.
90). In the very first post-war year, the socialist politic pulverized the most fundamental
institutional condition of the blatantly patriarchal pre-war gender order.
As one of the fundamental communists’ doctrines, gender equality guaranteed the women
in socialism the right to vote, to education (mandatory at the elementary level), employment and
equal wage; the law ordered removing the veil from the faces of the Muslim women in some
parts of the country, just as it allowed abortion. As anthropologists Renata Jambrešić Kirin and
Marina Blagaić sum it up: “In addition to health-care, social protection and organized child care,
these rights contributed significantly to women’s economic independence and their selfempowerment. They brought most benefits to the educated and employed women but, in the long
run, they also changed the social fabric of entire communities and enabled a considerable
horizontal and vertical mobility of women” (2103, p. 55).
However, the legal imperative of gender equality and the improvement of women’s
status, by rule went hand in hand with its discursive twin: the constant warnings that gender
equality is still not fully accomplished, despite all efforts that the state (during the state-socialist
stage), or society (during the self-management one) invested in women’s emancipation.
Constantly emphasizing that the legal framework itself does not amount to full emancipation, the
communists were incessantly changing the strategies and institutional frameworks that were
supposed to further the empowerment of women in all areas of life. An exemplary Party
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resolution from 1958 asserted that the issue of gender equality, resolved at the level of the
legislature, remains to be “the problem of economic underdevelopment, primitivism, religious
apprehensions, and other conservative prejudices, [such as those of] property relations that still
affect family life [problem ekonomske nerazvijenosti, primitivizma, religioznih shvatanja, drugih
konzervativnih predarasuda, privatno-svojinskog odnosa koji još dejstvuje na život u porodici]”
(Penava, 1981, p. 282). In a 1959 interview to the magazine Žena danas [Woman Today], Josip
Broz Tito elaborated:
Today it is often said that the woman returned to the kitchen voluntarily. No, she did not do it
voluntarily, but because the conditions forced her to do so. Because she has started a family and
7
now she is not able to get to places where she would were it not for the family; she is prevented
from participating in the social life in the ways she would were it not for the children. That is an
absolute certainty. However, men are also responsible for such position of women nowadays.
Many of our good men say to their wives: “You gave enough during the war, and now, after the
war, you should assume the place that belongs to women”. They forget that our women did not
deserve to be in the position that they occupied in the old Yugoslavia. Because [the women]
fought against such a position. If we were to deny them this, it would mean that the revolution did
not result in what we all fought, communists and other progressive people alike.
Danas se često kaže da se žena dobrovoljno vratila u kuhinju. Ne, ona to nije učinila dobrovoljno,
već zato što su je uslovi na to natjerali. Zato što je stvorila porodicu i nije u stanju da stigne
svugdje gdje bi mogla kad ne bi imala porodice; ona je spriječena da učestvuje u društvenom
životu onako kako bi mogla kad ne bi imala djece. To je potpuno sigurno. Ali, za današnji položaj
žena snose odgovornost i muškarci. Mnogi naši dobri ljudi kažu ženama: “Vi ste u ratu dale dosta,
i sada, poslije rata, treba da zauzmete mjesto koje pripada ženi”. Oni zaboravljaju da naša žena
nije zaslužila da ima ono mjesto koje je zauzimala u staroj Jugoslaviji. Jer, ona se protiv toga
borila. Kada bismo joj mi osporavali, značilo bi da revolucija nije dala ono za što smo se borili
svi mi, i komunisti i drugi progresivni ljudi.
(1977, p. 111)
As the time passed, however, it was more and more evident that not all of these problems can be
relegated to the remnants of the bygone era, but they are produced by the antagonisms and
deadlocks of the socialist modernity itself. Illustrative in that regard is an early 1970s
sociological study about the women and self-management in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The
author Franjo Kožul opens it with a pointed claim: “Numerous facts of life have been warning us
for years now that the process of emancipation of women in Bosnia and Herzegovina is slowed
down, if not stagnating [Brojne životne činjenice godinama nas upozoravaju da je proces
emancipacije žene u Bosni i Hercegovini usporen, ako ne i u zastoju]” (1973, p. 7), as indicated
with the problems such as “the double discrimination” (1973, p. 66), “permanent lagging of
women in the sphere of education [permanentno zaostajanje žene u obrazovnoj sferi]” (1973, p.
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67), or “permanent decrease of the number of the employed women [permanentno relativno
opadanje broja zaposlenih žena]” (1973, p. 101). Although the study acknowledges the law as
one of the preconditions for women’s emancipation, Kožul does not privilege it; instead he
maintains that “the social practice lags behind the legal-political regulation [praksa zaostaje iza
pravno-političke regulative]”, and that “the woman in [Bosnia and Herzegovina] is deeply aware
of the divergence between real life and legal norms [žena u BiH duboko svjesna ove divergencije
između stvarnog života i pravnih normi]” (1973, p. 62).
8
1.2.3 The demise of the revolutionary heroine
The complexities of gender emancipation in Yugoslav socialism sparked a significant scholarly
interest of feminist authors, upon whom my work substantially draws. As that theoretical lore is
by no means homogenous, let me here in shorthand – and with the inevitable simplifications, I
am afraid – emphasize some of their major stances and the differences within it.7
The most reductive of these views is the one that deems the gender order in the socialist
Yugoslavia just another patriarchal plot against women. The work of historian Barbara Jancar–
Webster, seminal as it is, remains notably tainted with this logic. For example, starting from a
premise that “History has no recent examples of women initiating or organizing the war”, she
concludes that “Women who become participants in a war are thus subordinated consciously or
unconsciously to the requirements and shape of the outcomes demanded by the leading
combatants” (Jancar–Webster, 1999, p. 68); this logic eventually frames the women participants
of the antifascist struggle as not much more than puppets controlled by the men. Along the same
lines, the Yugoslav socialism becomes an implicitly sexist conceit:
Authoritarian revolutionary regimes can liberate women only insofar as they understand
liberation as a tool to serve their purposes. Initially, when women are moving out of the domestic
environment of traditional society, the command nature of communist movements can produce
changes in their status with relative efficiency because the kinds of change involved are
susceptible to rule-making and administrative action. [...] However, the further advance of
women toward equal status in society brings into question the whole structure of the male
political hierarchy and hence is something that can only be won by women through their own
efforts.
(Jancar–Webster, 1999, p. 67–68)
The optics that sees the socialist emancipation in terms of its ambiguous legacy captures the
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complexity of the vicissitudes of the Yugoslav gender-equality project more felicitously. A
substantial part of feminist work on Yugoslav socialism – e.g. Božinović (1996), Jambrešić Kirin
(2008), Pejić (2010), Ramet (1999), Sklevicky (1996), Slapšak (2001; 2005) – wrestles with both
achievements and shortfalls of the Yugoslav socialism without yielding to the patriarchal or
totalitarian-model narratives; instead, these authors treat both patriarchal and emancipating
tendencies in socialism as historically conditioned. Interested in the paradoxes and contradictions
of the gender order of the Yugoslav modernity, this perspective itself produces contradictory
7
Although I refer to some specific authors, I do not want to personalize the particular stances; a more elaborated
account would easily demonstrate that many authors combine or oscillate between the several positions, depending
on the variety of focal points and lines of argumentation in their works.
9
theses and conclusions, yet in terms of the production of knowledge these contradictions are far
more important and productive than the certainties of the totalitarian-patriarchal plot.
According to the dominant feminist vantage, after the revolutionary change heavily
shattered the traditional patriarchal ways in the war and in the late 1940s, the 1950s brought the
re-patriarchalization or re-masculinization of the Yugoslav modernity. In their study on the
women workers in the Yugoslav plastics industry, Jambrešić Kirin and Blagaić elaborated this
gender shift in terms of a turn from “the world of production” to “the world of consumption”
(2013, p. 59). These two labels do not designate merely concrete economic practices but the
systems of values and aspirations. The demise of the world of production does not mean that, for
example, the women stopped working in the factories, but that their labour and their status of the
workers has lost the aura of dignity and social desirability that they held during the late 1940s. In
the same way, the consumption does not mean that all Yugoslavs flooded the first supermarkets
and fairs to actually consume a variety of goods: what the still poor nation was primarily
consumed was the very idea of consumption as the desirable activity, the notion that shopping is
a precondition of the happiness, well-being, and the social status. This veritable shift in values,
hence, was the testimony of “the exhaustion of the revolutionary morale” (Jambrešić Kirin &
Blagaić 2013, p. 57).
Such a substantial shift entailed a respective change in the system of representations,
which is inevitably gendered. Art historian Bojana Pejić traced the gradual, yet irreversible
disappearance of women figures from the arts (paintings and sculpture). In the late 1940s,
socialism realism boosted female allegorical figures which stood for the revolution, the antifascist struggle, and freedom. However, those images that coupled revolution and femininity
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“slowly departed from the collective remembrance staged in the monuments and films about our
Revolution”, being replaced by the masculine figures that started dominating
all major memorials, smaller monuments, films, as well as posters printed for annual celebrations
of the Day of the Republic. [...] The disappearance of the body of the (belligerent) comradess
from patriotic war memorials and films was just one move indicative of a de-gendering of
collective memory, of the two-gendered revolutionary endeavour, a shift that had already
occurred in the Soviet Union after the October Revolution.
(Pejić, 2010, p. 100, original emphasis).
In another move indicative of the same global shift in representation, as Jambrešić Kirin and
Blagaić detect, “The Soviet-like tough proletarian woman in a work uniform soon lost its
10
credibility, and the habit of former female partisans to wear side caps (the so-called titovka [the
Tito-style cap]) and war medals at the workplace disappeared; elegantly dressed and sexually
attractive women took over the women’s press and popular culture as early as the mid 1950s”
(2013, p. 60, original emphasis). A more detailed study would certainly discover many factors
that influenced the shift,8 but its main mechanism, after the introduction of the socialist-type of
market economy, was a Yugoslav version of “the society of spectacle”, to use the Guy Debord’s
trope. The femininity that was repressed from the sphere of revolution re-emerged in the sphere
of consumption: “the allegory of revolution and Muhin’s female proletarian became the girl from
the ad for Savica engines, Perion laundry detergent or Zvijezda refined edible oil” (Jambrešić
Kirin & Blagaić 2013, p. 61). As some of these products illustrate, these images re-domesticated
the exemplary socialist woman, linking her to the household milieu that was progressively being
filling up with the commodities (furniture, home appliances, etc.) that were at the same time
presented as the objects of desire of a modern woman, but at the same time re-directed her from
the public sphere to the private one. The revolutionary heroine that was eager to change the
world around her with the gun or in the workplace was replaced with a pretty housewife that
prefers governing her household and family, and her own appearance. According to Jambrešić
Kirin and Blagaić, that process amounted to “women’s unfinished political subjectivation. It was
accompanied by the political passivization of women and their sexualisation in the public sphere”
(2013, p. 59).
Stillman’s depiction of Yugoslavia in the early 1960s, which I have already tackled upon,
offers one of the most striking illustrations of this process:
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Dispirited Communist husbands have begun to retaliate in kind – shedding their superannuated
partizankas, as the dedicated women who fought alongside them [in WWII] are known, in favor
of younger, prettier, less ideologically marked wives – as often as not the daughters of the
“reactionary” urban classes they had expected to wipe out in 1945–1946. There is a social
reconciliation at work within today’s Yugoslavia; the two old social enemies, Communists and
bourgeoisie, are growing together. Time has begun to heal the wounds.
(Stillman, 1964, p. 92)
8
For example, the 1948 rift certainly had its share in this affair. In her speech in the late 1948, Vida Tomšič, one
of the most renowned communist ideologues, argued that the Yugoslav socialism “will stand for happiness”, in
contrast to the Soviet “gray bureaucratic socialism”; in order to more fully emphasize the difference between “our”
and Soviet socialism, she turned to the representations of femininity: “The women we see in the Russian newspapers
are all drably dressed. This alleged requirement of socialism negates all that we want – beauty, joy, and diversity”
(quoted in Pejić, 2010, p. 97).
11
Although, strictly speaking, it would be wrong to say that bourgeoisie persisted as a proper class
in Yugoslav socialism, some of it values most certainly did. Thus, although Stillman most
probably has in mind the actual marriages between the male communists and the daughters of the
bourgeois pedigree, I am here more interested in the ways in which these “red bourgeoisie”
matriomonies shaped the public imaginary of the Yugoslav modernity, most prominently with
the notion of the apolitical femininity. In other words, what remains symptomatic of the accounts
like Stillman’s,9 is not simply that one social group of women gets deprivileged, but the way how
one ideological-economic universe becomes gendered: in this case, how the communism is
reduced to the the “dispirited husbands”, whereas the bourgeoisie is incarnated in the “prettier
yet ideologically less marked wives”.
Hence, although I do not subscribe to each of Jambrešić Kirin’s and Blagaić’s
assumptions and conclusions,10 I find the gist of their argument salient. Taking it as the guideline
in my own research, I will explore the relation between the classical Yugoslav cinema as the
specific area of representation and the significant shift in gender representation during the period
in question. Before proceeding in that direction, however, let me define the classical Yugoslav
cinema and place it in its respective context – alas, again in a rather synoptic way.11
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9
Far more famous is the controversial Milovan Djilas’ attack on the new snobbery and immorality of the “new
class” of the Party parvenues in 1954. The attack zeroed in on the wives – it goes without saying: housewives – of
the high-ranking party functionaries, as the envious, idle, and gossping batch that embodies the worst of the new
class. Consequently, Djilas has been ostracized from the Party and became the most famous Yugoslav dissident.
Stillman directly refers to Djilas’s attack and takes it as a cue for his own quip about the conciliation of the two
ideologies.
10
For example, the thesis sometimes leans toward the men’s plot: indicative is a quote from the sociologist
Vjeran Katunarić: “Like the revolution itself, anti-patriarchal revolution was stopped when it was clear that it was
leading to either reified emancipation or women’s liberation unmatched in history, which no one could any longer
control” (quoted in Jambrešić Kirin and Blagaić, 2013, p. 57, fn. 31). Some theorists ascribe this revolutionary
potential to the Anti-Fascist Front of Women [Antifašistički front žena – AFŽ], the communist organization aimed
to both involving the women in the communist project and to the improvement of their lives; consequently, they
deem the replacement of AFŽ with the Alliance of the Women’s Organizations [Savez ženskih organizacija] in 1953
as the watershed moment of the Yugoslav communists effectively betraying their own project of gender equality.
However, I remain skeptical about the supposed capacity of that project to spin out of control into an
unprecedented liberation of women. I am closer to a view that does not overplay the importance of AFŽ (Burcar,
2014, forthcoming), especially given that the organization, faced with a legacy of poverty and patriarchal inequality,
for the most part aimed to help the women get some basic rights and skills, not always achieving even that minimum
(e.g. the AFŽ campaigns for removing the veil among the Muslim women in Bosnia and Herzegovina ultimately
failed, so the law was eventually passed in order to regulate this issue [Penava 1981]).
11
For more extensive, general accounts of the Yugoslav cinema of the period in question, see, e.g., Brenk (1962,
pp. 413–427, 439– 463), Goulding (2002, pp. 1–61), Kosanović (1966), Munitić (1977, pp. 31–137), Raspor (1988,
pp. 11–26, 61–66), Škrabalo (1984, pp. 121–256), and Volk (1975).
12
1.3.
The classical Yugoslav cinema
In pertaining to the concept of the classic Yugoslav cinema, I draw on Hrvoje Turković’s
analyses of style in Yugoslav cinema (1985a; 1985b; 2005a; 2012), which, at their most
elementary, draw on the tripartite scheme of primitive, classical, and modern cinema as the three
main mode of film practice, discernible both globally and domestically.12 Turković’s vantage is
coterminous with David Bordwell’s extensive elaboration of the concept of “mode of film
practice”, which posits the intricate relation between a film style and the respective mode of
production, as Bordwell most meticulously demonstrated with regard to the classical Hollywood
(Bordwell, Staiger & Thompson, 2005). Favouring the style analysis, Turković’s defines the
classical cinema primarily in terms of narration, the most elemental and succinct description of
which was provided by the American scholar:
The classical Hollywood film presents psychologically defined individuals who struggle to solve
a clear-cut problem or to attain specific goals. In the course of this struggle, the characters enter
into conflict with others or with external circumstances. The story ends with a decisive victory or
defeat, a resolution of the problem and a clear achievement or non achievement of the goals. The
principal causal agency is thus the character, a discriminated individual endowed with a
consistent batch of evident traits, qualities, and behaviors.
(Bordwell, 1985, p. 157)
When Yugoslav cinema appeared in the mid-1940, the classical narrative style was at the peak of
its hegemony from Hollywood to many Western European cinemas to the Eastern European ones.
Yugoslav cinema thus made its baby steps with its eyes on a variety of conventions and solutions
of the classical ilk, emulating it in the ways that were, as we shall see, conditioned by a set of
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specific historical circumstances. Generally speaking, the classical style dominated Yugoslav
cinema until the early 1960s, when – again drawing upon the international influences – the novi
film will emerge.
1.3.1. The early classical period
In accordance with the overall socio-political and economic shift described in the previous
subchapter, the classical Yugoslav cinema can be roughly divided in two sequences. The first
12
For other authors who expounded and utilized the concept, see, e.g., Belan (1977, pp. 48–64), Gilić (2011, pp.
47–68), Kragić (2013), Novaković (1970, pp. 23–29), and Šakić (2004; 2008; 2013).
13
one overlaps with the period of the Yugoslav allegiance to the Soviet Union. Attempts in
emulating the Soviet relation to cinema were discernible (1) in terms of defining the film
primarily as the propagandist and educational tool, which resulted in what Turković labels deems
the “ideologically-enlightening populism [ideološko–prosvjetiteljski populizam]” (1985a, pp.
16–19); and (2) in terms of its state-controlled organizational structure and economy, which
afterwards labeled this period as the administrative period (Kosanović, 1976).13 Paradigmatic of
the administrative governing were the Committee for Cinema in the Government of the
Federative People’s Republic of Yugoslavia [Komitet za kinematografiju Vlade FNRJ], founded
in 1946, and aiming to “establish a national film structure which would permit Yugoslavia to
stand on its own feet and to free itself, in a relatively brief time, from the necessity of depending
on foreign assistance and support” (2002, pp. 4–5).
Despite its centralized structure, the Committee paved the way for the first steps in
decentralization of Yugoslav cinema. The committees for cinema were soon founded in each
Yugoslav republic, together with the respective film enterprises. From 1946 to 1948, Yugoslavia
saw an intensive development of the first pool of its major film enterprises: Avala Film in
Belgrade (the Socialist Republic of Serbia), Jadran Film in Zagreb (SR Croatia), Triglav Film in
Ljubljana (SR Slovenia), Bosna Film in Sarajevo (SR Bosnia and Herzegovina), Vardar Film in
Skopje (SR Macedonia), and Lovćen Film in Budva (SR Montenegro). The grid of these film
houses will remain the main production infrastructure of the classic Yugoslav cinema.
Another success was an unprecedented cinefication [kinofikacija]. The war-torn film
theatres were repaired, and, even more importantly, the film theatres and projection halls were
built in the places where they had never existed in the first place; these cinemas were connected
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into a functional network for coordinated distribution, which was also integral to this project.
The kinofikacija resulted in a rapid increase of admissions, especially in the underdeveloped
regions of the country where film theatres were unimaginable before the war. An official in the
Bosnian committee for cinema lauded: “Certainly, no art after the war in our country has more
forcefully broke itself a path and conquered the hearts of the people to swiftly and so completely
as it was the case with cinema [Sigurno nijedna umjetnost poslije rata u našoj zemlji nije snažnije
13
For exemplary periodizations of Yugoslav cinema, see Kosanović (1976), Liehm and Liehm (1977), Munitić
(1979), and Goulding (1985). By rule, the differences between them are a matter of nuance and not of some
radically different or confronted views; one could say that we are constantly dealing with one and the same
periodization, which is slightly modified with each new author, depending on their focus and approach.
14
probila sebi put i osvojila srca naroda tako brzo i potpuno kao što je to slučaj s filmom]” (Finci,
1948, p. 73). The cinema-going statistics confirm this judgment (e.g. Goulding, 2002, p. 5).
However, the biggest challenge to the cinema-in-becoming was a total lack of
filmmaking experience. Cinema in the pre-socialist Yugoslavia had never developed into the
steady, continuous film production that would provide the post-war pioneers with some
infrastructure to build upon and tradition to draw upon (Kosanović, 2011; Slijepčević, 1982;
Škrabalo, 1984; Volk, 1986). Some of them left to study abroad, others enrolled in the expressly
founded film schools in the country, and most of them gained the first experiences shooting the
news reels and documentaries.14 This lack of experience was the main reason why Mira Liehm
and Antonín Liehm, despite noticing the major flaws of the first Yugoslav films, pleaded that
those works should not be harshly judged: “the first Yugoslav films were primarily evidence of
good will, enthusiasm, and persistence rather than works that can be measured by artistic criteria”
(1977, p. 124). However, the Yugoslav film critics from back in the day were not so forgiving.
As testified by a myriad of critical articles and public debates, they harshly criticized what Visko
Raspor, the most prominent among them, labeled the “cinematic primitivism [filmski
primitivizam]” (1988, p. 34).
The pervasive inaptitude enmeshed with what was considered to be the most proper
aesthetics, at least at the start of the administrative period: socialist realism. To what extent and
to what effects the Yugoslav cinema engaged with socialist realism is open to discussion. Some
critics and scholars underplay its influence (e.g. Liehm & Liehm, 1977; Čolić, 1984; Munitić,
1974), the others are more critical about it (e.g. Goulding, 2002; Šakić, 2004), whereas some of
the most recent scholarship blows it out of proportion (e.g. Musabegović, 2008; DeCuir, 2011).
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However, all of them effectively use a rudimentary and judgmental definition of socialist realism,
which posits the style as a priori intertwined with propaganda, by rule in the most pejorative –
and inadequate – meaning of the term.15 While we are still waiting for a comprehensive and
14
The most famous case of this early education was the Soviet production of V gorakh Yugoslavii/In the
Mountains of Yugoslavia (1946, Abram Room, Eduard Tisse), the feature film that designated the Yugoslav partisan
struggle from the Soviet vantage. The crew included the prospective Yugoslav filmmakers, who were supposed to
learn from their Soviet colleagues. Vjekoslav Afrić and Žorž Skrigin, who were to direct and shoot, respectively, the
first Yugoslav feature film Slavica, were also in the crew. Reportedly, unsatisfied with the Soviet version of the
Yugoslav antifascist resistance, they made Slavica as a critical response to In the Mountains of Yugoslavia.
15
In her path-breaking study of the communist propaganda in Yugoslavia from 1944 to 1951, Carol S. Lilly
warns that “propaganda” and “agitation” cannot be reduced to a mere “lying or a means of distracting public
attention from despotic government”; her research revealed that “in most cases CPY propaganda accurately reflected
15
nuanced study of socialist realism in Yugoslav cinema,16 I believe that it is safe to say that the
socialist realism cinema shaped Yugoslav cinema several years after the Stalin–Tito face-off,
gradually falling from grace (at least to some extent and in some circles), i.e. in Raymond
Williams’ terms, the status of socialist realism shifted from the hegemonic to the residual.
However, to fully acknowledge the presence of socialist realism in Yugoslav cinema is to fully
acknowledge its complexity. Believing that we should finally have to stop treating the style with
exclusively in dismissive terms, in the following pages I will demonstrate that there is more to
socialist realism than the one-note injunctions or the didactic sloganeering.
FIGURE 1.1–2 Early classical style: Slavica (1947)
The inexperience of the filmmakers and socialist realism gave birth to a style that “was
neither maturely classical nor early-primitive; it was [...] some variant of the primitive style, but
not the one which originates ab ovo, from the very beginning, but is founded upon the
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technological basis and some individual stylistic patterns that were developed and offered by the
classical cinema [nije bila ni zrelo klasična a ni ranoprimitivna; bila je to [...] neka varijanta
primitivnog stila, ali ne primitivnog stila koji nastaje ab ovo, iz samog početka, već nastaje na
tehnološkim temeljima i nekim pojedinačnim stilskim obrascima koje je razvio i nudio klasični film]”
(Turković, 2012). Hence, I label this peculiar style the early or immature classical style of
Yugoslav cinema (FIGURE 1.1–2).
the party’s short-term and/or long-term goals and intentions. Although party rhetoric did offer some outright lies,
[they] were easily recognized” (2001, p. 9).
16
For the exemplary studies that challenge the pejorative notion of socialist realism, see Clark (1981), and
Lahusen and Dobrenko (1997).
16
TABLE 1.1 The ratio of the WWII/partisan films (the first column), historical films (the second one),
and the socialism-set films (the third column), presented with the actual number of films
45
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
42
26
16
11
22
19
9
4
8
5
1947 - 1951
22
1952 - 1956
1957 - 1960
11
1961 - 1963
Thematically, half of the twenty feature films made from 1947 to 1951 designated the antifascist
struggle of the partisans, the communist-led guerrilla in WWII (TABLE 1.1). 17 The thematic
supremacy was hardly surprising given the importance that WWII and the partisan movement
had in the genesis of the socialist Yugoslavia. The Yugoslav debut feature Slavica (1947,
directed by Vjekoslav Afrić), alloyed romance, social drama, and some rather ambitious action.
A story of the antifascist rebellion in the countryside, Živjeće ovaj narod/This People Will Live
(1947, Nikola Popović) was designated as an epic story, the main protagonist of which is more
the collective of the peasantry and partisans, than any particular individual. Less epic in scope,
but also defined by the rustic countryside setting are Na svoji zemlji/On Their Own Soil (1948,
France Štiglic), Barba Žvane/Uncle Žvane (1949, Vjekoslav Afrić), and Major Bauk (1951,
Nikola Popović); Zastava/The Flag (1949, Branko Marjanović) explored shifts from the urban to
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the bucolic, as its main protagonist leaves the city of Zagreb, which is the deep shadow by the
quisling menace, for the pastoral province where she joins the partisans. Set in the big city of
Belgrade and deprived of the folklore note, Besmrtna mladost/Immortal Youth (1948, Vojislav
Nanović) was first of the suspenseful, thriller-like films about the communist resistance in the
urban centres, Crveni cvet/Red Flower (1950, Gustav Gavrin) was the first Yugoslav war
17
The table does not include the international co-productions, the most of which are set in the pre-WWII period.
If a film is substantailly set in several historical periods, I itemized it in the all respective columns.
17
prison/camp film. With is titular juvenile protagonist, Dečak Mita/The Boy Mita (1951) opened
the door for many WWII-set children and youth films.18
Out of five films set in the post-war present, four were celebrating the “renewal and
construction [obnova i izgradnja]” of the war-torn country one way or another. Život je naš/Life
is Ours (1948, Gustav Gavrin), was a clumsy heavy-handed ode to the youth labour brigades and
mass construction projects that build the country’s infrastructure in record time. Priča o
fabrici/Story of a Factory (1949, Vladimir Pogačić) and Jezero/Lake (1950, Radivoje Lola
Djukić), combined melodrama with sabotage plots, especially addressing the status of woman in
the urban and rural milieu, respectively. The first Yugoslav comedy Plavi 9/Blue 9 (1950, Krešo
Golik) introduced the motif of leisure through sports, yet carefully subdued it to the imperative
of the work. Poslednji dan/The Last Day (1951, Vladimir Pogačić) was the first Yugoslav
exercise in crime film.
Four films were set in the earlier historical epochs. Sofka (1949, Radoš Novaković), and
Bakonja fra Brne/Monk Brne’s Pupil (1951, Fedor Hanžeković) – the adaptations of the classical
realist novels by Bora Stanković and Simo Matavulj, respectively – both depicted how the old
patriarchal and class-biased norms destroy the lives of the vibrant, wide-eyed youngsters in the
second half of 19th century. Far merrier were the mythical universes of the films that targeted
young audience, drawing on the South Slavic folklore: Čudotvorni mač/The Miraculous Sword
(1950, Vojislav Nanović) was obviously inspired with the Soviet fantasy Kashchey
bessmertnyy/Koschei the Immortal (1944, Aleksandr Rou), whereas Kekec (1951, Jože Gale)
featured the fearless titular shepherd from the eponymous Slovenian children classic.
Itemizing most of the early classical cinema, I want to stress that its generic and thematic
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variety symptomatically reveals that, as Turković would have it, “Although without tradition, our
cinema did not develop in a vacuum. Our film theatres were over flown with varied, complex
18
Genre-wise, Majka Katina/Mother Katina (1949, Nikola Popović) is also a war film, although it is not set in
WWII and does not celebrate Yugoslav partisans, but the struggle of the communist guerrilla in the Greek civil war
in the late 1940s. Deeming it an atypical example of the genre, I counted it in the statistics on the WWII/partisan
films in TABLE 1.1.
Mother Katina is also interesting as the first (unofficially) banned Yugoslav feature film, as it never received a
certificate of approval and winded up shelved. The film vilified the role of Americans and the Western diplomacies
in the Greek conflict, but was completed in the moment when Yugoslavia, after being kicked out of Cominform, had
to turn to the West for political and economic support. One should appreciate the irony of the situation: whereas the
censorship in Yugoslav cinema is by rule seen in terms of dogmatism (e.g. the “black wave” campaign in the late
1960s as an example of “re-Stalinisation”), the very first ban in Yugoslav cinema was a pragmatic decision made in
attempt to court Americans and other Western democracies, i.e. to show that the country left the Stalinist East for
the West.
18
and developed patterns of filmmaking, from all around the world. Valuation standards were
suddenly increasing as the ideological iconography swiftly depleted [Premda bez tradicije, naš se
film nije razvijao u vakuumu. Naša su kina bila preplavljena raznovrsnim, složenim i razvijenim
uzorcima filmovanja, odasvud iz svijeta. Vrijednosni standardi naglo su rasli a zadana se
ideološka ikonografija brzo iscrpila]” (1985, p. 45).
1.3.2. The rise and zenith of the classical style
The second major period of Yugoslav cinema coincides with the first decade of the selfgoverning socialism. The most intense socio-economic development of the country could not but
profoundly affect cinema and film culture. Although Kosanović marks the beginning of the
period of reorganization with the disbanding of federal government’s Committee for Cinema in
1951 (1976, p. 53), the origins of the changes can be traced back to the self-management law in
1950 that transformed the film enterprises into the working organizations owned and run by their
own employees. The passing of the Basic Law on film [Osnovni zakon o filmu] in 1956 was
another milestone in the reform of Yugoslav cinema. The government finally realized that
cinema is too expensive to be handled in the way as it was during the administrative period. That
does not mean that the mechanisms of political control over cinema were utterly suspended in
the 1950s, yet their impact was relaxing as the economy was acknowledged as the real game in
the (Yugoslav Tinsel) town.
The managers of the film enterprises replaced the ideologues as the prime movers of the
Yugoslav cinema; hence the label “the producer’s cinema [producentska kinematografija]” for
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the organizational infrastructure of Yugoslav cinema from 1956 till 1962 (Škrabalo, 1984, pp.
177–186). The massive film enterprises were radically refashioned in order to become more
efficient and economic. The most of the fully employed filmmakers – directors, actors to
screenplay writers, cinematographers, composers, art directors, costume designers etc. – were
fired from the enterprises, and have been given the status of “the free-lance artists [slobodni
umjetnici]”, becoming employed from one production to another. Also, the so-called “technical
basis” units of the film enterprises (camera, lighting, sound equipment, laboratories etc.) were
decoupled from the production in the narrow sense (planning and budget, contracting the now
independent film artists, negotiating with the distribution companies, etc.). In the second half of
19
1950s it was the market that effectively shaped Yugoslav cinema, although it was still supported
by the republic funds for cinema – a testimony of the ever-lasting fact that, no matter how
intense economic development, Yugoslav cinema could never survive in the market terms only.
The films remain the best indicators of the sea change. First, in terms of quantity,
Yugoslav cinema was constantly on a rise, with some oscillations and the two significant leaps,
in 1956 and 1961 (TABLE 1.2).19 Also, the hegemony of socialist realism expireed by the mid1950s, as the WWII/partisan film loses its dominance over the historical and the contemporaryset films. The former gained upper hand over the two other groups in the first half of the 1950s,
whereas the latter were on a constant increase from the second half of the decade, plummeting in
the early 1960s into the largest batch (TABLE 1.1); they will keep that supremacy until the very
end of Yugoslav cinema in 1991.
TABLE 1.2 The number of feature films during the era of the classical Yugoslav cinema
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
1947 1948 1949 1950 1951 1952 1953 1954 1955 1956 1957 1958 1959 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964
Underneath these general shifts in style and setting, a sparkling differentiation of the
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genres continued. If we are to rely on Turković’s classification again, the didactic enlightening
populism of the socialist-realist ilk withdrew in front of the classical “urban and folklore
populism”, just as in front of the first attempts in “art cinema”; these categories are anything but
clear-cut separated (1985, pp. 19–27). As I cannot itemize here all the films of this period, I will
sketch the plurality of genres and styles by glossing the work of two prominent directors of the
classical Yugoslav cinema, Vladimir Pogačić and František Čap.
19
As the increase in film output coincided with the passing of the Basic Law in 1956, some periodizations
emphasize this year: Liehm and Liehm (1977) deem it the genuine end of the first stage of Yugoslav film, whereas
Ranko Munitić (1978) splits the 1950s into two periods, with 1956 as the turning point. According to Raspor, this
quantitive increase significantly coincided with the qualitative one: his general appraisal of the 1956 films is his first
positive judgement of the Yugoslav annual production (1988, pp. 115–120).
20
Pogačić’s work combines the art-elitist tendencies with the loose generic frames. After a
socialist-realist drama with a hint of suspense (Story of a Factory), and the first full-blown
exercise in the crime genre in Yugoslav cinema (The Last Day), Pogačić directed two
adaptations of the classical Yugoslav literature: an Oedipal melodrama that mixes class conflict
and the gender inequality in Dalmatia, the late 19th century, Nevjera/Shame (1953) is based on
the play “Ekvinocij [Equinox]” by Ivo Vojnović, whereas Anikina vremena/Anika’s Times
(1954), made after the eponymous novella by Ivo Andrić, designates the Ottoman Bosnia – or
rather Oriental milieu – in the noir-ish optics; Veliki i mali/The Big and the Small (1956),
delivers a mixture of family drama and chamber thriller set in WWII; the omnibus Subotom
uveče/Saturday Evening (1957) offered three slices of the socialist urban life in mid-1950s;
Sam/Alone (1959) is a WWII-set film about a encircled partisan unit; Pukotina raja/Heaven
without Love (1959) returns to the socialist present, to tell a story about a marital misery that
ends with the suicide of the main female protagonist; Karolina Riječka/Karolina of Rijeka (1961)
is another costumed melodrama adapted from an acclaimed literary source (the eponymous story
by Drago Gervais); his last feature film Čovjek sa fotografije/The Man in the Photograph (1963)
is another WWII-set thriller-like crime story.
When Czech émigré director František Čap entered Yugoslav cinema, he had more than
twenty films and several film prizes under his belt. His Yugoslav debut Vesna (1953) was a
game-changer in the Yugoslav cinema in more ways than one. Not only was it the first feature
that boasted the mature classical style, but apparently it had nothing with the themes and
imperatives that had dominated the cinema (the antifascist tradition, the reconstruction, or the
pre-war history of social inequalities). With its hearty and attractive adolescent cast of nonCEU eTD Collection
professionals engaged in a light-hearted high-school romantic comedy about mistaken identities
and first love, Vesna was recognized as the first “hollywoodized” Yugoslav film. It became a
smashing hit and won Čap a prize for directing, at the first Yugoslav film festival – still labeled
as a revue at that point – in Pula in 1954. After the partisan drama Trenutki odločitve/The
Moments of Decision (1955), Čap made the sequel to Vesna. Ne čakaj na maj/Don’t Whisper
(1957) flamboyantly surpassed the original with more good-looking and trendy youth, glamour,
leisure, sports, and music numbers. Vrata ostaju otvorena/The Doors Remain Open (1959) is a
melodrama about the juvenile delinquent who intrudes a hapless family, pretending to be their
son long lost in the war (FIGURE 1.3), whereas X 25 javlja/X 25 Reports (1960) is a spy thriller
21
about a young communist who infiltrates the Nazi secret service. A musical comedy Srešćemo se
večeras/We Will Meet Tonight (1962) catered to a national obsession with the music festivals in
the early 1960s, whereas Naš avto/Our Car (1962), a small town-set comedy of mentality,
ridiculed consumerism. As we shall see in the following pages, these are by no means the only
films that Čap made during this period.20
FIGURE 1.3 Mature classical style: The Doors Remain Open (1959)
The versatility of the two directors was not exceptional.21 The ripening and zenith of the classical
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Yugoslav cinema was a wonderfully mercurial mess: Hollywood-style melodramas were
mingling with neorealism, the western fused with the partisan film, the remnants of the socialistrealist didactics rubbed with musicals. Just as the styles and genres circulated and enmeshed, so
did the filmmakers. As the free workers, they could have applied with their projects to all film
enterprises, just as any enterprise could have offered a contract to any artist. That caused a
20
For more details about Čap, see Vrdlovec and Dolmark (1981), and Štefančič (2005).
I could easily replace them here with, for example, Branko Bauer and Žika Mitrović and I would get equally
rich variety of styles and genres. Indeed, the main reason for not detailing here Bauer’s and Mitrović’s oeuvre is that
I will later extensively analyze their films more than those of Pogačić and Čap.
21
22
notable migration of directors between the film centers.22 The actresses and actors travelled even
more intensively, as their popularity was not limited to the specific ethnic or cultural enclaves.
Severin Bijelić, Marija Crnobori, Milena Dravić, Boris Dvornik, Ilija Džuvalekovski, Irena
Kolesar, Marijan Lovrić, Olivera Marković, Rade Marković, Tamara Miletić, Antun Nalis, Stane
Sever, Bert Sotlar, Mira Stupica, Ljuba Tadić, Antun Vrdoljak, Pavle Vuisić, or Stevo Žigon – to
name just a few popular thespians – were gracing the films regardless of the film enterprise, i.e.
of the republic they were produced in. To be a film star in Yugoslav cinema meant to be an allYugoslav star.
The final illustration of the economic turn comes from the chronically under-researched
“international adventures” 23 of the classical Yugoslav cinema. When the government started
cutting its subsidies, the film enterprises expressly turned to the foreign production partners. The
joint ventures were targeting not only Yugoslav audience, and were supposed to provide the
Yugoslav filmmakers with opportunity to learn tricks of the trade from the more experienced and
knowledgeable colleagues from abroad. The first Yugoslav co-production was Poslednji
most/Die Letzte Brücke/The Last Bridge (1954, Helmut Käutner). The joined venture of Austrian
Cosmopol Film and Belgrade-based UFUS boasted the German and Austrian film stars such as
Maria Schell and Bernhard Wicki, and picturesque Yugoslav landscapes. In the next ten years,
The Last Bridge was followed by another sixteen that were marked as co-productions in the
Yugoslav register of films; the fact that only two of these were made with the partners from
Eastern bloc, illustrates the prevailing orientation in international matters. And yet, those coproductions are merely a tip of the iceberg of the international adventures of the classical
Yugoslav cinema, as the film enterprises were not always registered as the co-producers proper,
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but as providers of technical services. Already in 1953 – one year before The Last Bridge –
Triglav Film joined the Austrian film company Helios Filmproduktion in the production of Irene
in Nöten/Irene’s Dilemma, directed by E.W. Emo; by 1965 the Ljubljana enterprise took part in
ten more international co-productions that I did not itemize in the previous paragraph (Furlan et
al. 1994: 337). Or consider the case of Dubrava Film: formed from what used to be the
22
Consider the cinema of the Socialist Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina: out of twenty-three feature films
produced by the Sarajevo film enterprises from 1951 to 1963, only seven were directed by the filmmakers who were
Bosnians in terms of their place of birth or residence.
23
I borrow the term from Tim Bergfelder (2005), who used it to label the international co-productions that,
although part and parcel of the popular West German cinema in the 1960s, were too long despised by the
mainstream film criticism and scholarship.
23
“technical basis” of Jadran Film, the enterprise provided the technical services for thirty-nine
non-Yugoslav films, mainly Italian peplums, but also a few pearls like Abel Gance’s
Austerlitz/The Battle of Austerlitz (1960), and Orson Welles’ Trial (1962). Equally illustrative
are the Yugoslav films that were directed by the foreign directors, such as Claude Autant–Lara
Leonardo Bercovici, Giuseppe De Santis, and Andrzej Wajda, but do not officially stand for coproductions. And yet, if there was a single filmmaker who most fully embodied the international
adventures of the classical Yugoslav cinema, it was František Čap. Beside his seven
aforementioned Yugoslav features, he made three films for the non-Yugoslav producers: Hilfe –
Sie libt mich/Help – She Loves Me (1956), Die Geierwally/The Vulture Wally (1956), and La
ragazza della salina/Sand, Love and Salt (1957); and a Yugoslav international co-production Am
Anfang war es Sünde/In the Beginning was the Sin (1954).24
1.3.3. The rise of the modern Yugoslav cinema
In the early 1960s, the ever-developing Yugoslav cinema was about to undergo another major
reform, which was again based in the more general socio-political shift. The new Constitution,
which was passed in 1962, furthered the decentralization of the state, and the new Law on
protection of domestic cinema [Zakon o zaštiti domaćeg filma] followed suit. The film enterprises
lose monopoly as the new smaller production units like “film working association [filmska radna
zajednica]”, and independent production companies gain immediate access to the film funding.
The reshuffling of the institutional infrastructure buttressed the launching of “the watershed
decade” (Turković, 1985a, p. 43): supported with the more flexible production arrangements, the
modern cinema started occupying center stage under the sign of “the politics of auteur” and the
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novi film label.
Although the steep incline from the sixteen films produced in 1960 to the thirty two films
in 1961 marked the quantitative peak of “the producer cinema”, it also revealed the main flaw of
“the producer cinema”: catering to the supposed audience demands did not result in the increase
of the films’ quality. Nothing quite illustrated that deadlock like a small deluge of films that were
labeled as the “easy” or “commercial entertainment” genre: the musical comedies, the main
24
In his 1955 article, Raspor chastised the “epidemy of the co-productions [koprodukciona epidemija]”, pointing
out their minor artistic values and the submissive relation of the Yugoslav producers and filmmakers toward their
Western partners (1988, pp. 39–41).
24
element of which was estrada – the Yugoslav pop music and its celebrity culture.25 In the films
like Ljubav i moda/Love and Fashion (1960, Ljubomir Radičević), Nema malih bogova/There
are No Lesser Gods (1961, Radivoje Lola Djukić), Velika turneja/The Grand Tour (1961, Žorž
Skrigin), and Zvižduk u osam/Whistle at 8 p.m. (1962, Sava Mrmak), the actors were mingling
with the pop-music stars (Gabi Novak, Ivo Robić, and Djordje Marjanović, to name a few), as
the plots conveniently revolved around musical festivals, dancing halls, and fashion shows
(FIGURE 1.4).
FIGURE 1.4 The celluloid estrada: Velika turneja/The Grand Tour (1961)
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Nowadays these films stand, at their most general, as the social documents about the rise of
Yugoslav popular culture as integral to the general increase of the socio-economic standard in
the late 1950s and early 1960s; more specifically, they are indicative of the synergy between film
and record industry, as the most propulsive segment of the culture industry back then. However,
back then, the critics lambasted them as the double failure of the “producer’s cinema” formula:
they were bad and did not pay off (Boglić, 1962).26 As Petra Hanáková would have it, these
25
During the 1960s, the meaning of estrada will broaden as to include the folk music as well (Hofman, 2010).
The “easy” comedies controversy culminated in the affair around the film Šeki snima, pazi se!/Šeki is Shooting,
Beware! (1962, Marijan Vajda): the comedy about the (actual) football star Dragoslav Šekularac and his (fictive)
attempts to make a film, was deemed as so abysmal, that its director was excluded from the Serbian guild of
filmmakers (Polimac, 2009).
26
25
“easy” comedies were the exemplary “films that we are ashamed of”: a number of movies that
are not only considered worthless from the perspective of the global history of cinema, but are
also treated “with embarrassment and quickly discounted within the domestic context” for being
“perceived as an intellectual, moral and aesthetic wasteland” (2008, p. 111).
The critical attack on the blatant commercialism of the “producer’s cinema” was a
continuation of the criticism that had its origins earlier in the 1950s, as one of the first
expressions of the modernist tendencies in Yugoslav cinema. Some of the most lauded novi film
authors in the 1960s (e.g. Dušan Makavejev and Živojin Pavlović), started their careers in the
1950s as film critics and making their first short and experimental films in the “cine-clubs [kino
klub]” (Babac, 2001; Benčić, Nenadić & Perojević, 2012; Benčić & Sekulić, 2012). In the name
of the modernist developments and often with the zeal of the Young Turks, this new generation
persistently criticized their predecessors, in the film press and other public forums, as the
Yugoslav version of cinéma de papa, as it were.27
The proponents of novi film rightly claim that the modern cinema of the 1960s was
anticipated already in the 1950s, with the documentaries, experimental and short films of the
future novi film authors. However, they are often silent about the extent to which classical feature
conveyed or expressed the proto-modernist tendencies that boiled in the primordial ooze of the
classic Yugoslav cinema. As early as 1953, Šime Šimatović’s Kameni horizonti/Stone Horizons
short-circuited socialist realism with neorealist influences in an awkward mixture in which the
former’s overt enthusiasm confronted the dispassionate non-dramatic moments. With its framestory set in the first days after Liberation, Koncert/Concert (1954, Branko Belan) is a string of
flashbacks that ambitiously designate the film’s main protagonist as an episodic character in her
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own life, as it were. Not all proto-modernist influences came from art cinema. A film driven by a
couple of star-crossed anti-heroes, Pogačić’s Anika’s Times opens as a version of The Postman
Rings Twice set in the Oriental milieu, and decidedly designates the fierce female sexuality
through a set of metaphors. A crime story set in the railroad milieu, Poslednji kolosek/The Last
Track (1956, Žika Mitrović) offered the first protagonist who turned out to be a murderous,
remorseless villain. Disrespectful for the heroic tradition and the socialist values (embodied in
his own father), the restless and doomed criminal, for the first time conveyed much of the
27
See, for example, the recollections by Dušan Makavejev, Živojin Pavlović and Slobodan Selenić about the
odium against Vojislav Nanović (Pajkić, 1993); also, see Pajkić (2001, p. 247).
26
attitude which will be the trademark of many novi film protagonists. A story about a bus and a
truck that are about to collide, H-8... (1958, Nikola Tanhofer) casts the two narrators, who in an
emphatic voice-over, in a manner of the news reel commentators, anticipate the impeding
bloodbath right from the start, informing us about the back stories about the specific passengers
and carefully disclosing selected details about the crash, thus enticing suspense. In 1959, several
films dared to quit with the happy-endings, unambiguously positive characters, and heroic
narratives. I have already mentioned the suicidal heroine of Pogačić’s bleak marital drama
Heaven without Love; in his other, partisan film Alone, not even the final act of heroism utterly
recuperates the deeply disturbed nature of its protagonist, a hyper-nervous coward who schemes
his way to leave his squad and surrenders to the Nazis. Branko Bauer’s Tri Ane/Three Anas, a
neorealist-influenced story about a poor working man who tries to find a daughter lost in the war,
for the first time shows us the gritty underworld of the suburban slum, which will become the
standard setting of many novi films. Even Čap’s The Doors Remain Open, a melodrama which
was univocally roasted by the critics, hides under the Čapian trademark, sugar-coating a
protagonist far more troubled, and a denouement far more ambiguous than the contemporaneous
critics were willing to admit.28 Although these films did not bring the modernist turn in Yugoslav
cinema, they are indicative of the way in which the Yugoslav classic corresponded with the
proto-modernist tendencies in the contemporary European cinema. In other words, not modern
films per se, the titles like these did buttress and anticipate the modern Yugoslav cinema proper.
The filmmakers of the classic period reacted differently to the rise of the modernist
auteur-centered notion of cinema and the exhaustion of “producer cinema”. Some simply sank
(František Čap, Vojislav Nanović, Vladimir Pogačić), others tried to adapt to the imperatives of
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the modernist style to an extent (Branko Bauer, Nikola Tanhofer), whereas some transformed
into the novi film authors (Puriša Djordjević, Vatroslav Mimica). However, many continued to
make films in accordance with the classical narrative model (Krešo Golik, Žika Mitrović, Jovan
Živanović, and Bauer eventually returned to the classical narrative mode). Finally, what often
remains unsaid in the recent appraisals of novi film/“black wave”, the classical narrative model
also percolated some exemplary novi film works (Krsto Papić, Živojin Pavlović, Aleksandar
Petrović, Mića Popović).
28
For the proto-modernist readings of those and other classical films, see, for example, Jovanović (2012),
Novaković (2010), Polimac (1976), Šakić (2004; 2012), and Turković (2005b).
27
1.3.4 The celluloid gender: The myth, the degradation, the subject
Before elaborating extensively upon the ways in which Yugoslav cinema participated in the
shifts in imaginary that was integral to the gender order from the late 1940s to early 1960s, let
me sum up some of the first accounts of those matters, already penned by the critics in socialism.
We owe one of the first interventions of that kind to Mira Boglić, an influential film critic from
Zagreb, who embodied what we could call, with regard to her ideological allegiance, the
mainstream or hegemonic film criticism. In 1969, she published an article under the telling title
“Putovanje u neizvjesnost: Od mita do subjekta [A journey into uncertainty: From myth to
subject]”, which in the broad strokes discusses the vicissitudes of the female protagonists in the
Yugoslav cinema, during its first two decades. Not surprisingly, Boglić’s gambit zeroes in on
Slavica, the first Yugoslav feature, connoting the simultaneous – even synchronic – novelty of
the socialist order, gender emancipation and cinema: “Maybe it is not a coincidence that the new
era of cinema in Yugoslavia, that is the era of the continuous film-making, began with the film
titled Slavica. [...] Despite a number of male heroes, which continue to live in legend through
song and tale, one little girl had the honour to be the very first heroine of the new Yugoslav
cinema [Možda i nije slučajno što je nova era filma u Jugoslaviji, odnosno era filmskog
stvaralaštva u kontinuitetu započela filmom kojeg je naslov bio Slavica. ... Unatoč brojnim
muškim likovima, kojih je legenda snažno živjela i u pjesmi i usmenoj predaji, jedna je mala
djevojka doživjela tu čast da bude prva juankinja novog jugoslavenskog filma]” (1980, p. 121).
The classical cinema followed suite with many a WWII-set films that put the woman on the
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pedestal, such as:
a combatant, a nurturer, a consoler, a hero. She accomplishes dangerous tasks and dies
heroically on her battlefields of revolution. She is a shelter of warmth and lyric in the harsh
temptations of the war, on the weary marches and next to the hungry camp fires. She is a mother
who loses children and saves children, a widow, a sister, faithful “beloved”, who carries the gun
as an equal. The equality is not only recognized, but the woman character stands as some sort of
symbol of tenderness and poeticism in the wartime brutality, set very high, almost like a
monument, certainly as a myth.
i borac, i njegovateljica, i tješiteljica, i heroj. Ona izvršava opasne zadatke i herojski pogiba na
svojim bojištima revolucije. Ona je i utočište topline i lirike u teškim ratnim kušnjama, na
umornim marševima i kraj gladnih logorskih vatri. Ona je majka koja gubi djecu i spasava djecu,
udovica, sestra, vjerna “ljuba”, koja ravnopravno nosi pušku. Ravnopravnost ne samo da je
28
priznata već je ženski lik neki simbol nježnosti i poetike u ratnoj grubosti, postavljen vrlo visoko,
gotovo kao spomenik, svakako kao mit.
(Boglić, 1980, pp. 122–123)
However, even if one recognizes its affirmative character to an extent, the mythic wartime
femininity cannot remain the only type of the celluloid women. For Boglić, the myth is but a one
of the two extreme types of representations, which are the results of the male prejudices about
women: as the positive prejudices begets the myth, the negative ones wind up in the cinematic
degradation of a woman. The reference to degradation is anything but accidental. By 1969, when
Boglić writes her article, novi film flaunted the drastic images of femininity, either positing the
women as embodiment of the social sins, or as subjected to extreme physical and sexual
violence, and sometimes as both.29 Hence, with the novi film works in mind, Boglić concluded
that the Yugoslav cinema stands in the middle between the mythic and degrading images of
women, but “with the obvious tendency for the latter [s očitom tendencijom prema drugoj]”
(1980, p. 122). And yet, the critic did not simply dismiss all modern representations of women,
but questions the authenticity of their status:
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The same thing that happened to the male hero starts happening to the female as well. After all,
from Slavica the partisan to Izabela the switchboard operator, Višnja from Tašmajdan, poor
peasant Marija, the little house maid and one divorced Mom, twenty years have passed and
during that time one myth gave way to the very realistic portraits. The contemporary woman has
stepped into our cinema, and with her came some of her problems. However, the question is
whether the woman – even in those films where the scribes wanted – became the main
protagonist, the leading figure, whether she became a subject.
Ono što se dogodilo s muškim herojem u nas, počinje se događati i sa ženskim. Od Slavice
partizanke do Izabele poštarice, Višnje s Tašmajdana, sirote seljanke Marije, male kućne
pomoćnice i jedne rastavljene Mame, prošlo je ipak dvadeset godina i za to vrijeme jedan mit
ustupio je mjesto veoma realističnim portretima. Suvremena žena kročila je u naš film, a s njom
je došlo i ponešto njezinih problema. Pa ipak se postavlja pitanje je li žena zaista i u onim
filmovima gdje su to scenaristi željeli postala glavna junakinja, vodeći lik, da li je postala subjekt.
(Boglić, 1980, p. 122)30
29
In 1967, Petar Krelja wrote “Opake žene [The fatal women]”, to the best of my knowledge the first article that
tackled the unflattering – to say the least – images of women in the Yugoslav novi film. More on this in the next
chapter.
30
Beside Slavica from the eponymous film, Boglić also refers to the female protagonists of the films Ljubavni
slučaj ili tragedija službenice PTT/Love Affair, or the Tragedy of a Switchboard Operator (1967, Dušan Makavejev),
Višnja na Tašmajdanu/Višnja at Tašmajdan (1968, Stole Janković), Sirota Marija/Poor Marija (1968, Dragoslav
Lazić), Tri sata za ljubav/Three Hours for Love (1968, Fadil Hadžić), and Imam 2 mame i 2 tate/I've Got 2 Moms
and 2 Dads (1968, Krešo Golik).
29
Acknowledging that the classical Yugoslav film had its share of female protagonists, Boglić
nevertheless argues that all of their attempts to become the proper subjects failed: “the womanobject fails to emerge from her fish tank [žena objekt ne uspijeva isplivati iz svog akvarija]”
(1980, p. 124). The first genuine female subject in Yugoslav cinema, according to Boglić, will
appear in Ples v dežju/A Dance in the Rain (1961, Boštjan Hladnik): “She is Maruša, who pays
for her liberation with her life, but wins it nevertheless. [At] the threshold of a mature age, aware
that she has failed in every segment of her life, including her last romance, she finds strength to
commit a conscious suicide. That is a contemporary Joan of Arc, who dies to set free the heroin
of the Yugoslav cinema of all of her addictions. [To je Maruša, koja doduše svoje oslobodjenje
plaća životom, ali ga osvaja. [Na] pragu zrelih godina, svjesna da je promašila sve u životu, pa i
svoju posljednju ljubav, nalazi snage za svjesno samoubojstvo. To je suvremena Jeanne d’Arc,
koja umire da bi junakinju jugoslavenskog filma oslobodila svih zavisnosti]” (1980, p. 124).
Hladnik’s heroine has thus broken the ice, and a variety of female subjects in Yugoslav cinema
did appear: Boglić recognizes them in the protagonists of Prekobrojna/The Superfluous One
(1962, Branko Bauer), Rana jesen/Early Autumn (1962, Toma Janić), Čudna devojka/Strange
Girl (1962, Jovan Živanović), Tople godine/Warm Years (1966, Dragoslav Lazić) etc. And yet,
reducing the balance of the modern Yugoslav cinema at the end of the 1960s, Boglić concluded
that the filmmakers, even when foregrounding the women and apparently empathizing with her,
actually more pertained to their fetishist visions of women, than to the truth of the many
Yugoslav women who are not the erotic dolls, patriarchal petty-bourgeoisie, or the poor girls
cheated by the macho types: “the reality of the Yugoslav working woman does not exist in our
films. [That] ordinary, normal and everyday woman remains unknown to our cinema; it has no
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interest in her in this moment of exultation and grand effects [stvarnost jugoslavenske radne žene
ne postoji u našim filmovima. (Tu) običnu, normalnu i svakodnevnu ženu naš film ne poznaje,
ona mu u ovom trenutku egzaltacije i velikih efekata nije interesantna]” (1980, p. 125).
It is not without irony that from our vantage – which includes the criticism of the
objectification of women along the ideals of the consumer society – even Boglić’s exemplary
celluloid female subject – Maruša in A Dance in the Rain – turns to be a woman-object. She
decides to commit suicide in an attempt to save her own image of her younger, prettier, and more
desirable self. In a crass eruption of scorn, her reluctant lover Peter lambasts her in public as the
old and ugly woman: “You have such ugly hands! I hate them! And your face – I never liked it!
30
It is too wide, your eyes too large... And your skin is not soft, you do not nurture it! What an
ugly, neglected skin!” Maruša leaves the restaurant where this humiliating act takes place –
Peter, as if entranced with his own rant, does not even notice that she is gone! – and goes back
home where she repeats the lover’s accusations: “What did he say? Ugly, plain [hands] – are
these a woman’s hands at all? [...] Old, repulsive, even as a mistress! What if all this is true?”
Eventually, she concludes: “Reality is my enemy. I want another reality, my own reality! Yes,
forever! I will not let them steal my world!” – and drinks the poison that she had in stash. These
over-the-top theatrics were hardly part of the everyday reality of the ordinary working woman
that Boglić argued for in the very same article, yet they do tell something about the women’s
anxiety caused by maturing and getting, under the pressure of the standards of beautiful, youthful
femininity in the early Yugoslav consumerist age. But, most of all, the film is about the men’s
power to superimpose their own fantasies of women over the real women. In what is arguably
the film’s most grotesque scene, a young man, who idealizes Maruša to a point of paroxysm,
comes to her apartment, gently talks to her, kisses her feet, and finally leaves, absolutely blind to
the fact that his diva who silently sits in the armchair is not flabbergasted by his adoration but
simply dead.
Boglić was by no means the first who criticized the gender/sexual politics of modernist
cinema already back in the 1960s and early 1970s. Exemplary in that regards was Petar Krelja’s
article “Kobne žene jugoslavenskog filma [The Fatal Women of Yugoslav film]” (1970), and its
main point that derogatory representations of women were nothing short of the defining trait of
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novi film:
the common of the new Yugoslav film is – a woman! From the outset we have to explain that the
more significant works of domestic cinema uphold the thought of women bearing a great deal of
guilt because the world in which we live is not better, more beautiful or more noble [...]. Our
domestic authors charge them severely and put them on bench for the accussed not only because
these women – allegedly – unambigously accepted the morality that is characteristic of the
problematic milieus, but also because they, by means of their profoundly vice-ridden behavior,
themselves imprinted their fire-heated branding iron of the amorality on the denuded body of life.
[A]s the works of Yugoslav cinema persuade us, women are debauched to the extent that is
fantastical, terrifying and fatal for the future of this milieu.
zajedničko novijeg jugoslavenskog filma sadržano je – u ženi! Odmah moramo objasniti da
značajnija djela domaće igrane kinematografije zagovaraju misao da dobar dio krivnje što svijet u
kojem živimo nije bolji, ljepši i plemenitiji snosi ženska čeljad [...]. Domaći autori teško ih terete
i bacaju na optuženičku klupu [...] ne samo zato što su – navodno – bez dvoumljenja prihvatile
moral svojstven problematičnim sredinama, već i zbog toga što su svojim duboko poročnim
31
ponašanjem i same utisnule svoj originalni usijani žig amoralnog na razgolićenom tijelu života.
[K]ako nas uvjeravaju djela jugoslavenske kinematografije, žene su se pokvarile do fantastičnih,
zastrašujućih i po sudbinu ove sredine fatalnih razmjera.
(p. 26)
Elaborating his point with virtually all of the novi film canon, Krelja invokes Panic in the Streets
(1950, Elia Kazan), noir thriller in which police chases a gangster who accidentally contracted a
deadly virus and thus could spread the plague. In a similar way, says Krelja, the novi film
filmmakers consider that the woman “in her fragile organism and feeble spirit may
unconsciously carry the vice of our society” (1970, p. 36).
Krelja’s article fascinates in more ways than one. Historically, it precedes the classics of
the Western feminist film theory, itself only in a larval stage back then.31 Unfortunatelly, it did
not incite any substantial lineage of gender-related film criticism in Yugoslavia, a testimony that
the machoist attitude did not only dominate filmmaking but also significantly influenced film
criticism as well. In terms of strategy, Krelja cuts to the chase at the expense of more elaborated
analysis that might have revealed important differences in the gender politics from one director
to another. However, I find the gist of the thesis salient: for all its hailed novelty and courage, a
significant portion of novi film relied on the outworn misogynist mantra on the instinctual
sexuality as the alpha and omega of femininity.
To be sure, Krelja stopping short of directly accusing novi film as such of misogyny. In
another of his strategic claims, he warns that the Yugoslav filmmakers “do not charge and
prosecute the woman […] because of some of her alleged innate – feminine – weaknesses and
proclivity towards treachery, as some unknowledgable people might believe [ne terete i ne
proganjaju ženu (...) zbog nekih njezinih urodjenih – ženskih – slabosti i sklonosti k izdajstvu,
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kako bi neupućeni pojedinci mogli povjerovati]” (1970, p. 36). The filmmakers’ focus on the
woman as the main embodiment of the societal symptom reveals above all their laziness: instead
of looking for other, more complex examples and expressions of social problems, they use the
woman as their most visible manifestations. Their unforgiving depiction of women, in ultima
linea, reveal them not as misogynist, but lazy and univentive authors.
Critically drawing on the insights of Boglić and Krelja, this thesis is not so much after
establishing the standards of the proper female subjectivity, or detecting the failed versions of it.
31
Krelja penned the first version of the article under the title “Opake žene [The fatal women]”, and published it
in 1967.
32
Instead, I will be more interested in the ways how the specific gender-related film narratives,
motifs, and images shifted historically, without being guided by some teleology of “subject”,
being it masculine or feminine. In other words, this thesis is a far cry from attempting to
establish the formula of the “new socialist woman”, the “new socialist man”, or some other type
of the socialist subjectivity, but more about the antagonism that thwart the possibility of those
formulas from the start. In the following subchapter, I will outline the theoretical and conceptual
preliminaries underlying this project.
1.4.
Toward the Yugoslav cultural revolution
At its most theoretical level, this thesis relies on those strands of critical theory that deem the
notion of ideology, in the words of Fredric Jameson, “surely the key link or mediatory concept in
any attempt to link cultural objects with social phenomena” (1977, p. 543). Jameson famously
conceptualized that link as “the political unconscious” (2002), mixing Marxism and
psychoanalysis, the main theoretical tools of the feminist film theory. In a homology with the
fundamental psychoanalytical notion of unconscious as the psychic domain that comprises
incoherent and often contradictory impulses, the political unconscious embraces similar
dynamics in the social field. Whereas the unconscious can be traced in dreams and other
compromise formations from which the analysts then reconstruct the conflicted impulses, one
can grasp the political unconscious through the works of culture, by means of which the critical
theory should unravel and address the respective social contradictions.
Appropriating and varying this model, the feminist theory maintains that ideology, and
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does not merely act upon gender, but is integral to its very re-formation from one historical
socio-political context to another. Explicating the link between gender and concept of the
ideological work, Mary Poovey pointed out its twofold emphasis: first, as “the work of
ideology”, representations of gender were “part of the system of interdependent images in which
various ideologies became accessible to individual men and women”; second, “the work of
making ideology” asserts that “representations of gender constituted one of the sites on which
ideological systems were simultaneously constructed and contested [and] at which struggles for
authority occurred, as well as the locus of assumptions used to underwrite the very authority that
authorized these struggles” (1988, p. 2).
33
One can tackle the relentless work of ideology by means of the “dominant fiction”,
another concept integral to the theoretical premises of the thesis. Jacques Rancière defined it as
“the privileged mode of representation by which the image of social consensus is offered to the
members of a social formation and within they are asked to identify themselves” (quoted in
Silverman 1992: 30), whereas Kaja Silverman appropriated it and re-elaborates the substantial
role of gender and sexuality in the social consensus: “The dominant fiction neutralizes the
contradictions which organize the social formation by fostering collective identifications and
desires, identifications and desires which have a range of effects, but which are first and
foremost constitutive of sexual difference” (1994, p. 54). Conceived this way, the dominant
fiction chimes in with another key concept articulated in the dialogue between psychoanalysis
and Marxism: the conceptualization of fantasy as a social affair. Defying the notion of fantasy as
a figment of imagination which resists reality, psychoanalytical theory emphasizes that our
experience of reality is always framed by or filtered through some fantasy framework: “Social
reality is always traversed by some fundamental impossibility, by an ‘antagonism’ which
prevents reality from being fully symbolized. It is fantasy that attempts to symbolize or
otherwise fill out this empty place of social reality. Fantasy thus functions as a scenario that
conceals the ultimate inconsistency of society” (Salecl, 1994, p. 15).32
Psychoanalytical theory additionally furthers this line of conceptualization with the
notion of the “big Other”: the symbolic network of a given socio-ideological order, which
encompasses a variety of the symbolic codes and rules – languages, laws, norms, values, and
habits – many of them unwritten or vaguely assumed. By means of the big Other, we develop the
very own experience of reality, i.e. the big Other provides us with the basic framework for
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grasping the “world” around us, and also endows us with different symbolic mandates and
statuses, thus shaping our identity. At its purest, the symbolic structure of the big Other is
fictitious and quasi-transcendental: it does not stand for a positive social fact, but appears to be
more than a sum of concrete, existing institutions in a socio-ideological field (Salecl, 1994, p.
149, fn. 18). Consequently, then, the big Other cannot be but ridden by many ambiguities,
contradictions and impasses; hence the Lacanian quip that “the big Other does not exist”, that is,
“the big Other exists only to the extent that the subject presupposes the Other as an ideal order –
32
This insight is substantial in the re-conceptualization of ideology along the lines of Lacanian psychoanalysis,
as most famously exemplified in the work of Slavoj Žižek (1989; 1997).
34
a system, logic or discourse which assures the meaning and consistency of the subject’s action”
(Salecl, 1994, p. 104). As this ideal order does not exist (i.e. the concrete social institutions that
emobody it cannot live up to it), the subject can be perplexed or traumatized by the symbolic
mandate that the big Other bestowed upon her or him:
So, loaded with this mandate, the subject is automatically confronted with a certain “Che vuoi?”,
with a question of the Other. [...] the question is, of course, unanswerable. The subject does not
know why he is occupying this place in the symbolic network. His own answer to this “che vuoi?”
of the Other can only be the hysterical question: “Why am I what I’m supposed to be, why have I
this mandate? Why am I [a teacher, a master, a king . . . or George Kaplan]?” Briefly: “Why am I
what you [the big Other] are saying that I am?”
(Žižek, 1989, p. 113, original emphasis)33
In that regard, Lacan’s big Other overlaps with Rancier’s concept of “dominant fiction”:
Although they might be grounded in some concrete social facts and institutions, they first and
foremost operate at the level of the fantasy as the social binder.
An important stream of film studies kept on challenging the notions of social consensus
and harmony, by designating the ideology as dispersed, dynamic, and ever oscillating between
affirmation and contestation. Exemplary is the concept of Barbara Klinger’s “cinematic histoire
totale” as “a totalized view [that] provides a sense, not of the ideology the [film] text had in
historical context, but its many ideologies. By placing a film within multifarious intertextual and
historical frames—the elements that define its situation in a complex discursive and social
milieu—the film’s variable, even contradictory, ideological meanings come into focus” (1997, p.
110, original emphasis).
Accordingly, my thesis analyzes the Yugoslav films – that is, the film representations of
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gender – as indicative of many socio-ideological contradictions and struggles that were
concealed by dominant fictions of early socialism, i.e. fantasies of a consistent big Other of the
budding socialist modernity. Jameson’s revamping of Lenin’s concept of “cultural revolution”
can help us to additionally elaborate on those inconsistencies. Criticizing the old Marxist
assumption that each socio-economic formation is tied to a single respective mode of production,
33
Slavoj Žižek incessantly re-elaborates the notion of big Other as one of the key Lacan's notions. This
paragraph is exemplary: “The ‘big Other’ is simultaneously the presupposed Reason which confers meaning upon
the meaningless contingency, and the pure appearance of Meaning to be maintained at any price. It is
simultaneously another human being in its unfathomable singularity, beyond the ‘wall of language’ – the ‘person’ in
its elusive abyss – and the ‘anonymous’ symbolic mechanism which regulates intersubjective exchanges” (2008, p.
226, fn. 22).
35
Jameson argues that in every historical society there is “the overlay and structural coexistence of
several modes of production all at once […], including vestiges and survivals of older modes of
production, now relegated to structurally dependent positions within the new, as well as
anticipatory tendencies which are potentially inconsistent with the existing system but have not
yet generated an autonomous space of their own” (2002, p. 80, original emphasis). Consequently,
he asserts that the cultural artifacts “emerge in a space in which we may expect them to be
crisscrossed and intersected by a variety of impulses from contradictory modes of cultural
production all at once”, and defines cultural revolution as “that moment in which the coexistence
of various modes of production becomes visibly antagonistic, their contradictions moving to the
very center of political, social, and historical life” (Jameson, 2002, p. 81). Jameson also insists
that by cultural revolution one should not designate a punctual or short yet intense event or
“transitional” period which we usually label revolution, for they are only momentary
manifestations of what effectively is “a permanent process in human societies, of a permanent
struggle between the various coexisting modes of production”; hence, the cultural analysis
should rewrite “its materials in such a way that this perpetual cultural revolution can be
apprehended and read as the deeper and more permanent constitutive structure in which the
empirical textual objects know intelligibility” (2002, p. 83).
By appropriating the concept of cultural revolution, I explore gender motifs in Yugoslav
films in terms of the perpetual struggle of different conceptions, which can be all too easily
obfuscated if – along the totalitarian-model rostrum – one assumes that the gender order was just
another mechanism of totalitarian terror. I argue that the gender order of Yugoslav socialism
should be treated as a heterogeneous mixture of values, ideas, habits, norms, and practices,
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which we should not reduce to an ideology in the sense of the monolithic doctrine. Many of the
notions of gender that circulated the socialist Yugoslavia were inherited or taken from the presocialist epoch, while some others were imported from non-socialist societies. The simple fact
that they originated from non-socialist political context, did not necessarily mean that they were
at odds with the socialist principles and that they could not play significant role in Yugoslav
cultural revolution. This may seem more important if we take into consideration that the history
of the Yugoslav socialism coincides with the one of the Cold War, to which Yugoslavia
responded with its own strategies (e.g. the self-management at home, the concept of nonalignment in the international relations).
36
1.5.
The structure of the thesis
In exploring and describing the gender-related issues of the Yugoslav socialist modernity as
captured by and shaped by its respective classical cinema, I propose to contribute to at least three
interrelated sets of literature in film/cinema studies, feminist scholarship, and history of the
socialist period. First, I hope to contribute to the scholarship on the socialist-era cinema/film in
Eastern Europe in general. By the mid-2000s this scholarship was dominated by the elemental
chronological histories of the specific national cinemas,34 whereas the second half of the decade
witnessed the increase in theoretically informed academic work, which by now has established
itself into a steady flux.35 However, despite some major works (Mazierska, 2008; Mazierska,
2010; Mazierska and Ostrowska 2006), the gender as the analytical category and theoretical
framework still did not firmly established itself in the field. Hence, I find gender integral in
creating a left-field perspective of the study, which also includes a decided disregard for two still
hegemonic features of the Eastern European cinema: the auteur-centered approach and the focus
on the proverbial “Golden Age” of modern cinema in the late 1950s and 1960s. However, just as
I firmly believe that the Eastern European “new waves” justly deserve to be explored from here
to eternity, I will argue that that should not be done at the expense of the cinema that preceded
them.
All these remarks apply in regard to the Yugoslav cinema scholarship as well. First, the
lack of gender-related film analysis continues to plague the research of Yugoslav cinema. An
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article now and then (e.g. Dimitrijević, 2008; Jovanović, 2012; Kovačević, 2000; Kronja, 2012;
Mozetič, 2009; Slapšak, 2000; Radić, 2011), and only one book-length study – Maja Bogojević’s
Cinematic gaze, Gender and Nation in Yugoslav Film: 1945–1991 (2013) – are hardly an
enviable state of the gender-aware film theory. Second, as testified by the recent string of books
34
See, e.g., Haltof (2002), Cunningham (2003), and Goulding (2003). For more theory-based approaches, see
Feinstein (2002), Iordanova (2003), and Oleksy, Ostrowska, and Stevenson (2000).
35
To a different degree, theory informs Berghahn (2005), Hanáková and Johnson (2010), Imre (2012), Iordanova
(2006), Levi (2007), Mortimer (2009), Näripea and Trossek (2008), Owen (2011), Piwowarska and Ronduda (2008),
and Skrodzka (2012), among others. Launched in 2010, Studies in Eastern European Cinema, as the first academic
journal that showcases the cinemas of the region offers the supreme symbol of the new scholarship on Eastern
European cinema.
37
on Yugoslav cinema, the researchers of Yugoslav cinema are still dominantly focusing on the
novi film canon and its authors (DeCuir, 2011; Erent and Rhoads 2014, forthcoming; Kirn,
Sekulić & Testen, 2012; Mortimer, 2009; Sudar, 2013). However, the context of the Yugoslav
cinema scholarship begs an additional yet substantial remark. Unlike the cinema histories of the
rest of the socialist European East, the history of the Yugoslav cinema has virtually disappeared
as the object of research among the post-Yugoslav critics and scholars. In the moment when I
started work on the thesis, dismantlement into the distinct ethno-national cinema entities was still
dominant approach to the past of Yugoslav cinema. Strongly opposing such a treatment, I argue
that the new epistemological and theoretical frameworks – most notably, the feminist and
gender-related ones – are sine qua non of the vindication of Yugoslav cinema as a field of the
scholarly interest.
Last but not least, I believe that the findings and arguments displayed in this study
should not be seen as limited to the fields of Eastern European and Yugoslav cinema studies, as
they might also contribute to the changing vision of the socialist cinema during the Cold war in
European and global terms. The notion of the Yugoslav cultural revolution paves the way for an
understanding of both Yugoslav cinema and gender order as not merely socialist affairs, in the
sense of conveying only the presupposed communist doctrines. More than being a socialist
gender order and a socialist cinema, they were a gender order and a cinema in socialism which
encompassed not only the communist party dogmas but also a number of influences from the
Western side of the Iron Curtain. Although this study does not directly explore those influences
in a more direct way (say, by researching the dominance of Hollywood and Western European
films in the Yugoslav film theatres), it nevertheless paves the way for the further exploration in
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that direction.
The most important part of my research was finding out and watching the feature films of
the classical period: out of 185 films released from 1947 until the end of 1962, I have found and
watched a little bit more than half of them. The elemental fact that some films were more
accessible than others inevitably influenced the focus of the study. My final selection of the films
analyzed in the thesis draws upon the thematic similarities of the works that turned out to be the
most accessible: the WWII/partisan films, the films set in the context of the post-WWII
reconstruction of the country, and the films about the peasantry. In other words, the thesis
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explores the celluloid images of the three major protagonists of the Yugoslav socialist
revolution: the partisan, the worker, and the peasant – not necessarily distinct in many cases.
The first chapter tackles the epistemological issues that gave rise to this thesis in the first
place. In its first part, I dispute the use of the term “totalitarian cinema” as appropriate with
regard to the Eastern European cinemas of the socialist era in general. I find that term illustrative
of the totalitarian model that still substantially shapes many scholarly vantages of those cinemas.
Then I turn to Michel Foucault for the epistemological and methodological tools for challenging
the historical accounts that maintain the totalitarian model. I find especially useful the concepts
of the “ascending type” of the historical analysis and of “apparatus [dispositif]”, both of which
Foucault developed most fully while researching gender and sexuality. To explore the Yugoslav
cinema in the Foucauldian optics amounts to their re-articulation from a heinous area of the
heinous totalitarian control and repression, as defined by the totalitarian-cinema model, into a
complex spheres of the sex-and-gender apparatus in socialism.
Tackling gender-related motifs in the classical WWII-set/partisan films, the second
chapter wrestles with the major prejudices that describe this category of films almost exclusively
in terms of the regime propaganda, i.e. relegating them to the set of the non-truths about WWII
in the Yugoslav territories. That misconception of the genre lies in the assumption of a clear-cut
Good versus the Evil dichotomy – embodied in the celluloid partisans and the occupiers
respectively – as its dogmatic kernel. Analyzed through the gender optics, however, the allegedly
black-and-white world of the WWII/partisan films turns out to be full of many shades of gray. I
illustrate some of these by showcasing figures and plots such as the “collaborationist” woman
(i.e. the love affair between “our” women and occupying soldiers), the differentiation of the
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family along the ideological lines, and the reluctant occupiers.
The third chapter explores the relation between gender and work as designated by the
classical Yugoslav films. My particular focus is the “construction cycle”: a string of films
produced from 1948 to 1958, and set in the context of the “renewal and construction [obnova i
izgradnja]” of the war-ravaged country and the socialist society. Relying on the thesis about the
exhaustion of revolutionary morale in the 1950s (the devaluation of work in the name of
consumption, the re-domestification and objectification of women), the chapter will explore the
ways in which tendencies correlate with the designation of work and its participants in the
“construction” films. The chapter particularly explores how the genre of melodrama and the
39
notion of romance turned out to be integral in shaping the male privilege as the dominant gender
constellation in these films.
After the chapters dealing with the celluloid partisans and workers, the last chapter
tackles the film representation of peasantry as the third important protagonist of the
revolutionary change.
The
intense
socialist
modernization
primarily by means
of
industrialization affected the Yugoslav countryside in an unprecedented way, precipitating a
number of economic and cultural processes, which the Yugoslav filmmakers always deemed as
rather inspiring. The peasant films analyzed in this chapter, first, screen more intricate accounts
of the rural patriarchal legacy starting from the pre-socialist period, and second, render how
some of its most malignant ramifications have found their way into the socialist modernity.
The approach that treats the films as social documents of their respective gender order
excludes not only the author-centered approach, but also the dominant focus on the critically
lauded films, i.e. the films that stand for the canon of the classical Yugoslav film in terms of their
artistic merits. Gender and sexuality feature in all films, not only the critics’ sweethearts: a film
that the critics deemed mediocre or outright bad might be revelatory in terms of some specific
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gender issue.
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Chapter 2
Towards a new epistemology of Yugoslav cinema
The chapter wrestles with a set of epistemological and methodological aspects of exploration of
Eastern European cinemas in socialism in general and Yugoslav cinema in particular. The
starting point of the chapter is the notion, apparently effective in the Anglo-American film
studies mainstream, that the Eastern European cinemas of the socialist era belong under the
rubric of “totalitarian cinemas”. I problematize that assumption, deeming it an effect of the socalled totalitarian model or paradigm that still shapes many a scholarly account of the historical
period. In the second part of the chapter I argue that Michel Foucault provides with with the
salient epistemological and methodological tools for dismantling the historical accounts forged
by means of the totalitarian model, not only with regard to Yugoslav cinema but also to
Yugoslav socialist modernity at large. The most prominent among these tools are the “ascending
type” of the historical analysis, and the interrelated concept of “apparatus [dispositif]”. It is not
coincidence that Foucault developed those epistemological strategies and methodological tools
while researching gender and sexuality; hence, the vindication of Yugoslav cinema along the
Foucauldian lines would reaffirm the pivotal role of gender and sexuality not only in cinema
itself but also in socialist modernity at large. This epistemological move would transform
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Yugoslav cinema from a nefarious totalitarian mechanism, as posited by the totalitarian-cinema
model, into one of the privileged spheres of the sex-and-gender apparatus in socialism.
2.1.
Questioning the totalitarian model
2.1.1. Totalitarian cinema and the Cold War epistemology
In “Reconceptualizing National Cinema/s”, one of the seminal articles on the category of the
“national cinema”, Stephen Crofts developed an interesting typology of national cinemas: (a)
European-model art cinemas, (b) Third Cinema, (c) Third World and European commercial
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cinemas, (d) the national cinemas that ignore Hollywood, (e) the national cinemas that imitate
Hollywood, (f) totalitarian cinemas, and (g) regional/ethnic cinemas (1993). Since the concept of
“totalitarian cinema” is of my primary interest, let me somewhat extensively quote what Crofts
makes of it:
Sixth, there is the national cinema of the totalitarian state: Fascist Germany and Italy, Chinese
cinema between 1949 and the mid-1980s, and, of course, the Stalinist regimes of the Soviet bloc.
By far the predominant mode of the Communist brand of such national cinemas has been socialist
realism, which sought to convince viewers of the virtues of the existing political order [...].
Peripheral to this core production has been the often political art cinema of Tarkovsky, Jancsó,
Makaveyev (sic!), Wajda, various proponents of the Cuban and Czech New Waves, and Chinese
Fifth Generation cinema.
(2002, p. 37)
Crofts’ account captures in the nutshell the so-called totalitarian model or paradigm. Originally
used for descriptions of Fascism and Nazism from the 1920s to the 1940, the concept of
“totalitarianism” was revamped after World War II. In accordance with the ideological agenda of
the Western democracies in the Cold War era, “totalitarianism” posited the homology between
the Soviet Union and The Third Reich. With the Nazi project effectively dead and gone, the
major thrust of the totalitarian thesis effectively targeted the USSR and other socialist
countries.36
According to the paradigm, totalitarian was a state in which a dogmatic and corrupt
regime, incarnated in one-party rule and strong, charismatic leader, terrorized its subjects by
repression, brutality and propaganda. This diagnosis was made with focus on the Soviet Union:
“Soviet system under Stalin consisted of a nonpluralist, hierarchical dictatorship in which
command authority existed only at the top of the pyramid of political power. Ideology and
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violence were monopolies of the ruling elite, which passed its orders down a pseudo-military
chain of command” (Getty and Manning, 1993, p. 1). In the 1970s, however, a new generation of
historians of Soviet history—often called “revisionists”—substantially challenged the totalitarian
model. The important aspect of the dethroning of the totalitarian model were the epistemological
and methodological turns in the humanities: the rise of social and cultural history diminished the
preponderance of political history, whereas the interdisciplinary influences from anthropology
36
For arguably the most extensive critical genealogy of the term “totalitarianism” and the debates around it, see
Geyer and Fitzpatrick (2009, pp. 3–40); see also Buck-Morss (2000), Fitzpatrick (1986), Getty (1987), Komelj
(2011), Landsman (2005), Losurdo (2004), Madarász (2003), Pence and Betts (2011), and Traverso (2007).
42
and cultural studies also significantly contributed to the more complex accounts of the socialist
modernity.
Crofts’ account, unfortunately, illustrates that the cinema studies are ignorant of the new
approaches in the history of “the Stalinist regimes of the Soviet bloc”. Slavoj Žižek asserted that
“the notion of ‘totalitarianism’, far from being an effective theoretical concept, is a kind of
stopgap [which] relieves us of the duty to think, or even actively prevents us from thinking”
(2001, p. 3, original emphasis); along the same lines, we could say that Crofts’ account excludes
the shifts, nuances, and complexities of the Eastern European socialist modernity, by obfuscating
it with the notion of Stalinism. The inclusion of Yugoslavia into the Soviet bloc, from which it
was expelled as early as 1948, is symptomatic of his strategy. True, beginning his taxonomy,
Crofts asserted that its categories are “highly permeable” and that “individual films cross-breed
from between different groups [and even] a given national cinema [...] often straddle these
groupings” (2002, p. 27). However, in the case of the Eastern European totalitarian cinemas, it
transpires that only the exemplary dissident auteurs – Tarkovski at al. – could “cross-breed”
between the Stalinist milieu and, apparently, “European-model art cinemas”. However, even
these political provocateurs are but a “peripheral” for Crofts. Whereas Yugoslav cinema, as
other Eastern European cinemas of the socialist period, combined art and commercial cinema,
the category of the totalitarianism erases that fact with the historically false argument about the
predominance of socialist realism, and shoe-horns these cinemas in the box that subsumes
Stalinism and Nazism.
To the best of my knowledge, Anikó Imre was the first to astutely elaborate the effects of
the totalitarian model in Eastern European cinema scholarship. In “East European cinemas in
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new perspective”, she expounds that the scarcity of theoretical and historical accounts of Eastern
European cinema is caused by the persistence of “the epistemological parameters of the Cold
War world order: films of the region were evaluated by the West, in the West, and for the West
on a selective basis […] privileging films and directors who took an oppositional stand in
relation to communist totalitarianism in their filmic commentaries on national events of great
historical importance” (Imre, 2005, p. xii).
Drawing from Imre’s criticism, let me outline what I see as the basic template of the
totalitarian paradigm in the sphere of arts and culture: it is the juxtaposition between Artist and
Regime, Art and Propaganda, Dissidence and Dogma. According to these set of binaries, the
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Regime, vicious and tyrannical in its core, is first and foremost the agency of the totalitarian
terror. Founded on absurd and amoral dogmatic premises, the Regime must rely on massive
propaganda and all-pervasive censorship to counter any criticism and keep its founding dogmas
alive. Opposed to the Regime’s ideological manipulations, stands the Artist who is guided by an
innate sense of freedom, humanism, and democracy. Although he – for the Artist is, by rule, a
male auteur – might have some personal idiosyncrasies (as the additional proof of his genius),
the Artist is untainted by any ideological misgivings. Since he bespeaks the truth, the Regime
cannot but oppress him. The Artist is a suffering victim, yet he triumphs morally and
intellectually.
This Manichean juxtaposition encompasses many dichotomies – good vs. bad, liberation
vs. oppression etc. – that “continued to guide and simplify […] the interpretation of East
European films” (Imre, 2005, p. xiii), maintaining the narratives of the “binary socialism”,
critically elaborated by Alexei Yurchak (2006). Caricatural as it might sound after the criticism
of the totalitarian paradigm, this dichotomous scheme still roams around. Consider how John
Patterson, film critic in The Guardian, recently sketched the East European cinemas of the
socialist era: “For every 10 party hacks [among the filmmakers in socialism] there were one or
two sublime dissidents or innovators – Polanski and Wajda in Poland, Jancsó in Hungary, Dušan
Makavejev in Yugoslavia – and we shouldn’t throw out all these beautiful babies with the stale
red bath water” (2012).
Imre also emphasizes the detrimental effects that this critical fetish of auteur had on for
scholarship on Eastern European cinema scholarship. Once the western critics recognized him as
the imbribable hero who subverts the regime, the more exhaustive inquiry of the socialist
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cinemas has become unnecessary and superfluous:
the single-minded attention to oppressive state politics versus dissident intellectual politics
imagined film cultures as if they were in a temporal and theoretical vacuum: the auteur, larger
than life and frozen in a romantic modernist gesture, functioned as a gatekeeper to guard against
theoretical currents that were concurrently transforming the study of film elsewhere [i.e. outside
Eastern Europe], from semiotics to psychoanalysis, feminism to cultural studies, studies of
identity and representation to theories of spectatorships.
(Imre, 2005, p. xiv)
Hailed as revolutionary by many anticommunists, the year of 1989 did not precipitated any
revolutionary theoretical turn in scholarship on Eastern European cinema in socialism. Instead,
“The end of the Cold War, which has opened up exciting new avenues of study and the potential
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to reformulate reigning theories, is proving to be the very impediment to launching such studies”
(Imre, 2005, p. xvi). Hence, “far from being completed, the reevaluation of the film cultures of
the socialist era has not even begun” (Imre, 2005, p. xvii).
Imre’s conclusion was rather timely. Whilst the elemental national-cinema chronology
dominated the scholarship of Eastern European cinema up to 2005, the second half of the decade
witnessed the increase of theory-informed scholarship, which by 2013 has established itself into
a steady flux. However, it is too early to make the definitive statements about the reach and
impact of this theoretical reevaluation, especially in terms of the scholarship on European cinema
in general. For all its flourishing, the Eastern European cinema scholarship still might be
perceived as an insular affair, and its subject as substantially decoupled from the “proper”
European politico-cultural context. Consider the example from Mark Betz’s book on European
art cinema:
a conception of a divided, Cold War Europe […] produces constitutively different forms of
historical analysis. The history of numerous Eastern Central European new waves is thus
grounded in the historical and political context of the Soviet bloc: the ideological thaw following
the death of Stalin provides a space for freer filmic practices that critique the totalitarianism of the
Communist Party. Western European new waves, on the other hand, are considered according to a
different set of criteria. Here, “new” refers to philosophical question and aesthetic innovations
that have less to do with politics or ideology than with the aesthetics of filmic style and meaning.
The jump cut, the long take, intertextual referencing, and other narrative destructions are thus
characteristic of the broader intellectual and philosophical (as opposed to political) concerns of
Western culture, ranging from moral decadence (Buñuel, Visconti) to metaphysical doubt
(Bresson, Bergman) to existential questioning (Resnais, Antonioni) to technological
dehumanization (Tati, Godard) to humanist understanding.
(2008, p. 34)
Although already in the next paragraph Betz questions “these retrograde modernist sensibilities”
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and proposes that we should explore them “through a postmodern interpretative framework”, that
apparently applies only for the Western new waves. Since he has nothing else to say about
Eastern European cinemas, it seems that the Cold War divide ultimately remains at its place,
sealing them off the new readings and realignments – not a minor thing in a book with the
subtitle “Remapping European Art Cinema”, and in the chapter titled “Recovering European Art
Cinema”. If one is to judge on the basis of this particular example, it will require more stamina
and work to stop deeming the cinemas of Eastern Europe merely “totalitarian”, i.e. to integrate
them into accounts of European cinema.
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2.1.2. The totalitarian model in the Yugoslav context
The end of socialism in Yugoslavia intertwined with the exceptionally complex and violent end
of the country itself. The nationalist political elites that seized power in Yugoslav republics in the
late 1980, described the end of socialism and the arrival of party pluralism as the crucial moment
for achieving, as the phrase went, the centuries-old dreams of nations for sovereignty in the form
of the distinct nation-states. Consequently, they orchestrated and conducted the dismantlement of
Yugoslavia, which had its genocidal climax in the wars in Croatia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina
(1991–1995) – indisputably the most brutal political event that marked the end of the socialist
epoch in East Europe.
The totalitarian-model logic was one of the key ingredients of the chauvinist, antiYugoslav politics. The nationalist ideologues rendered the socialist Yugoslavia as an artificial,
imposed totalitarian abomination that impeded the Yugoslav nations from accomplishing their
“natural” aim – having a nation-state on their own. The backlash against the “totalitarian”
Yugoslavia generally resembles the totalitarian-model depictions of Soviet Union under Stalin,
but with an additional twist that can be illustrated with an anecdote about the promotion of the
Bosnian translation of the controversial Black Book of Communism (Courtois et al., 1999). The
local publishers and editors of the translation attacked their guest, the Czech historian Karel
Bartošek, for not including Yugoslavia and Titoism in his chapter on the Eastern Europe.
Bartošek explained that Yugoslavia did not meet the Black Book criteria of a totalitarian state,
and even admitted that back in the 1960s, when he could not enter Czechoslovakia to meet his
family, they would use Yugoslavia as the meeting point. That detail ignited his hosts, who
warned him that the very fact that he did not experience Yugoslavia as a totalitarian state was the
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indisputable evidence of how cunningly totalitarian Titoism actually was. A local presenter
exulted: “Tito was such a master that he surpassed Stalin in hiding the traces of his crime”
(Hećimović, 1999, p. 37). Yugoslav totalitarianism thus acted like the proverbial Satan who
spreads word that he actually does not exist only to additionally cement his power: the very
absence of totalitarian traits is the main trick by which the Yugoslav regime concealed its truly
totalitarian core, i.e. the fact that it was actually far worse than the overtly totalitarian regimes.
The premise that Stalin pales as an amateur in comparison to Tito turns Yugoslav socialism into
presumably the most perverse type of totalitarianism in the European East.
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We should not overlook, however, that some of the more theoretically sophisticated
accounts of the socialist Yugoslavia as the totalitarian state were elaborated not by the right-wing
nationalist intelligentsia, as those who published Black Book of Communism in Bosnia and
Herzegovina, but by the intellectuals who are often recognized and praised as the sharp critics of
the nationalist ideology and its devastating effect in post-Yugoslav successor states (e.g. Banac,
2003; Džaja, 2004; Kasapović, 2005; Mahmutćehajić, 2000). According to them, both the
Yugoslav socialism and post-Yugoslav nationalism are, fundamentally, the two faces of the same
totalitarian and anti-modern coin. They allegedly share the one and the same “deep grammar”
which determines them as social, political and economic aberrations with regard to the “proper”
road-to-modernity, which is recognized in the capitalist patterns of economic and social
development (Vlaisavljević, 1998). That argument kills two birds with one stone. Not only that
the totalitarian model explains socio-political vicissitudes of Yugoslavia in terms of the Titoist
repression, but also argues that the violent and bloody breakup of the country was the price that
had to be paid for existence of such an abnormal totalitarian system.
All these accounts, however, share a fundamental trait which is criticized by Miklavž
Komelj to whom we owe the most concise criticism of the totalitarian-model stance with regard
to both Eastern Europe in general and Yugoslavia in particular. According to him, a designation
of Yugoslavia as a totalitarian state covers up a simple fact: the wars in the 1990s happened only
after the democratic system had replaced the allegedly totalitarian one, i.e. few years after the
first multi-party elections and parliamentary democracy: “thus if we talk about ‘totalitarianism’,
we do it in order to forget how the process of ‘democratization’ in the 1980s in Yugoslavia also
unleashed the most reactionary forces of nationalism, chauvisim, militant zelotism etc. [Ako
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govorimo o ‘totalitarizmu’, dakle, to činimo zato da bismo zaboravili kako je proces
‘demokratizacije’ osamdesetih godina u Jugoslaviji bio i prava eskapada najreakcionarnijih sila,
nacionalizama, šovinizma, vojnog huškaštva itd.]” (Komelj, 2011, pp. 191–192). In that sense,
the war in the 1990s was not an expression of some alleged totalitarian legacy, but of the
shortcomings of the newly introduced multi-party democracy.
2.1.3. The “de-Yugoslavization” of Yugoslav cinema and the totalitarian model
In the process of dismantlement of Yugoslavia in the name of ethno-national imperative, a
number of the filmmakers, film critics and historians acted as the proponents and guardians of
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the ethnic Thing. If “[n]owhere was the idea and reality of ‘Yugoslavia’ more fruitful than in its
cinema” (Johnson, 2009), the zeal with which the nation-centered historians and critics
retroactively partitioned of history of Yugoslav cinema along the lines of the political division of
the country in the 1990s should not be surprising. Nataša Ďurovičová and Dina Iordanova aptly
described this process as “a ‘proliferation of new film-historiographical entities to match the
various continuously redrawn state boundaries,’ aiming to establish a new, principally Serbian
(Croat, Bosnian, etc.) canon as well as a set of distinct ‘national’ aesthetic criteria” (Iordanova,
2005, p. 235). Some critics graced the obliteration of Yugoslav cinematic heritage with some
quite inventive terminology: Croatian filmmaker, critic and historian Ivo Škrabalo argued for the
“de-Yugoslavization [dejugoslavizacija]” (1999, p. 76), whereas his Serbian colleague Bogdan
Tirnanić prefered “the cinematic demarcation [filmsko razgraničenje]” (2008, p. 9). Whatever was
the term used here, this aspect of the anti-Yugoslav backlash encompassed various strategies of
defaming, falsifying, and erasing of the four decades of Yugoslav cinema, as testified by a string
of books and articles (e.g. Munitić, 1999; Ognjanović and Velisavljević, 2008; Pajkić, 2010;
Volk, 2001), which overpowered the rare voices who criticized the nationalist imperative (Radić,
1999; Štefančič, 2006; Buden and Žilnik, 2013).
The logic of the totalitarian paradigm was a key to the cinematic de-Yugoslavization or
delimitation. The nationally-aware film critics and scholars fully relied on the totalitarian model,
describing Yugoslav cinema in socialism with two homilies. They chided Yugoslav cinema, first,
as one of the principal propaganda tools of Tito’s totalitarian regime, and, second, as an arena in
which the regime brutally exercised absolute repressive power in order to protect its dogmas.
If we stick with Škrabalo and Tirnanić as the exemplary proponents of the anti-Yugoslav
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backlash in cinema history and criticism, we shall see that the national imperative in their work
is inseparable from the anti-communist or anti-socialist totalitarian model. Already in the first
lines of his magnum opus on Croatian national cinema, Škrabalo zeroes in on Lenin himself and
chides the Soviet revolution for “trigger[ing] the avalanche of violence and repression in our
century [pokrenula lavinu nasilja i represije u našem stoljeću]” (1998, p. 7), as if World War I
had never happened. Such a head-on strategy is hardly surprising, since from the perspective of
the Croatian national ideology, which participated in the dismantlement of Yugoslavia, the
socialism with its multinationality and interethnic solidarity was the ultimate threat to the purity
and unity of Croat nation.
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Tirnanić offers even bleaker picture of rapport between socialism and cinema. His 2008
book, tellingly titled Black Wave, is illustrative of the backlash tendency to relegate the history
of Yugoslav cinema to synecdoche of the “bunker”, the dark and deep dungeon where forbidden
films were incarcerated (e.g. Miloradović, 2004; Nikodijević, 1995).37 Of course, that vantage is
not endemic for the post-Yugoslav accounts of the cinema of the socialist era. One cannot but
recall the lucid verdict by Thomas Elsaesser and Michael Wedel of the ways in which some
public voices in the unified Germany account for the GDR Verbotsfilme: “A more exemplary
case of Walter Benjamin’s assertion that history is always written by the winners is difficult to
imagine: it is as if the forbidden films, had they not existed, would have had to be invented, so
perfectly did they fit into the re-writing strategies of West German cultural institutions” (2001,
pp. 6–7).
Tirnanić’s book is titled after the “black wave” label that the nomenklatura used as the
derogatory banner under which it attacked some of the novi film works from 1969 to 1972.
Although Tirnanić describes the most exemplary of those cases, he uses the “black wave” as the
synecdoche for any state-institutional intervention in Yugoslav cinema. As if the concrete cases
of the “black wave” campaign were not enough, Black Wave glosses over many non-“black
wave” affairs, the oldest one being from the early 1950s. Tirnanić concludes with what could be
called the karmic trope of the totalitarian model: “All that comprised Yugoslav cinema was
politically disputed in all sorts of ways, but a heavy price was paid for this: the society which
defended itself by repressing its best films was sentenced to live the fate foretold by those very
films [Sve ono što je činilo jednu kinematografiju politički je osporavano na ovaj ili onaj način,
ali je to skupo plaćeno: društvo koje se represijama branilo od svojih najboljih filmova beše
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osudjeno da prodje onako kako su ti filmovi predvidjali]” (2008, p. 198). To be sure, this type of
mystification had its critics (e.g. Buden, 2008), yet it still can be traced in some attempts of
elevating the filmmakers into the national prophets or the clairvoyants of the Yugoslav
breakdown (e.g. Smiljanić, 2008; Pajkić, 2010; DeCuir, 2012).
However, the most damaging expression the totalitarian model in the recent Yugoslav
cinema scholarship is an overarching division of Yugoslav cinema into the two groups of films
and filmmakers along the aforementioned “Artist versus Regime” or “Art versus Propaganda”
binary. I deem this divide the most detrimental for it is at play not only in the backlash accounts
37
See also documentary Zabranjeni bez zabrane (2007, Milan Nikodijević and Dinko Tucaković).
49
concocted along the lines of the totalitarian model, but even in the works of the scholars who
cannot be accused for pursuit of the chauvinist or anti-socialist agenda. The fact that the
totalitarian paradigm so successfully spilled over the confines of the anti-Yugoslav backlash is
the testimony to its triumph. Thus in the following pages I will mostly tackle the ways in which
the totalitarian model informes – or, rather, misinformes – the works of the scholars whom I see
as my co-travellers in the project of vindication of Yugoslav cinema as a field of historical and
theoretical analysis. To do otherwise, i.e. to criticize the backlash authors only, would be
something like shooting the easy mark and, in my opinion, not very productive. Before
proceeding in that direction, however, let me first introduce the theoretical and epistemological
framework which I deem salient and precious for the purpose of challenging the totalitarian
model in the context of Yugoslav socialist modernity.
2.2.
A Foucauldian dismantling of the totalitarianism
2.2.1. The totalitarian model as a “repression hypothesis”
In the first volume of The History of Sexuality (1978), Michel Foucault famously attacked the
“repression hypothesis”, which posited that the prudish Western bourgeoisie prohibited and
tabooed sexuality from early capitalist modernity onwards. The criticism was the continuation of
Foucault’s epistemological move that eventually resulted in the conceptualization of power as
not necessarily negative and repressive mechanism. This theoretical development was instigated
and guided by his dismissal of the “global theories” that argue that one supreme, dominant
agency determines the social field totally. Foucault illustrated it with the privileged role of class
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and economy in Marxist theory: “I believe that anything [i.e. any phenomenon in capitalist
society] can be deduced from the general phenomenon of the domination of the bourgeois class”
(1980, p. 100), he quipped, calling this type of deduction the descending type of analysis.
Theories and analyses of the descending type define “power [as] essentially that which
represses. Power represses nature, the instincts, a class, individuals. [It] has become almost
automatic in parlance of the times to define power as organ of repression” (Foucault, 1980, pp.
89–90). While he does not claim that the institutional repression and domination do not exist at
all, Foucalt nevertheless maintains that it is a misguiding to privilege them as the fundamental
principles of the modern socio-political field. Historians of modernity, hence, should not limit
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the analysis of power to the research of the mechanisms of the top bottom repression. Instead,
they should engage in the ascending type of analysis, which should replace the notion of the
domineering, monolith power with more refined structures that should not be lumped together
under some generalized, supreme agency (e.g. “the bourgeois class”).
Already this sketch of Foucault’s account shows why I find his reconceptualization of
power crucial for the dismantling the totalitarian model. Structurally, the totalitarian model is a
variant of the repression theory, which argues that the the socialist rule, as the determining
agency in respective societies, exercised the repression that capillary reached practically every
cell of the society. The totalitarian model thus amounts to the descending type of analysis, which
can deduce anything from the single fact of the existence of the socialist rule, as embodied in the
Regime, the Dictator, or the Party. In a socialist society everything seems to be fully determined
by its relation to that domination, as I illustrate in the following subchapter with the examples
from Yugoslav cinema.
Dismissing the binary logic that permeates the accounts of the repression of sexuality,
Foucault asserted: “it is time to put an end to this kind of dualism, of Manichaeism, which puts
discourse, freedom, truth, broad daylight on one side, and on the other silence, repression,
ignorance, night” (1996, p. 162). I could easily paraphrase him to describe the epistemological
shift that this study aims to achieve. The historians of Yugoslav cinema (and of Yugoslav
socialist modernity in general), should finally stop inspecting the objects of their research with
Manichean optics. In other words, they should quit relegating the filmmakers in the socialist era
to only two positions: the auteur who resists the regime, and the party hack who supports it.
Instead, it is time to challenge the “artist vs. regime” dichotomy by means of ascending type of
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analysis, which would inquiry variety of the concrete social agents instead of shoehorning them
into the generalized and indiscriminate categories such as “regime” or “the Party”. I will now
turn to the most pervasive examples of the dichotomous outline of Yugoslav cinema in
socialism, first by describing them and then by proposing the critical counter-perspectives.
2.2.2. The Art pole of Yugoslav cinema
The historians and critics who pursue the totalitarian-model binaries such as “Art versus
Ideology” or “Artist versus Regime” effectively picture Yugoslav cinema as divided by the deep
and irreparable schism that is by rule illustrated by two allegedly incommensurable blocs of
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films and filmmakers. In this subchapter I will tackle only one of these two poles: the
Art/Auteur/Dissident pole that is by rule reserved for some of the most acclaimed works of novi
film. The reason for not tackling its opposite – the allegedly dogmatic, brainwashing filmmaking
done by the totalitarian drones – is very simple: the rest of my thesis engages with the films and
filmmakers that are usually deemed “the stale red bath water” of the Yugoslav cinema, as the
critic from The Guardian would have it.
In accordance to the descending logic of analysis, the critics define and homogenize the
Art pole of the dichotomy first and foremost in terms of their criticism (oppositionality,
subversion, dissidence) toward the regime. This tendency appears as particularly anachronous in
the light of Pavle Levi’s Disintegration in Frames (2007), which theoretically elaborated what
the novi film authors and their fellow critics were actually repeating all along: first, the
filmmakers who are more often than not indiscriminately lumped under the label of “dissidence”
substantially differ in terms of both aestehtics and ideology; second, their filmmaking cannot be
dominantly defined in terms of the “social criticism” or in the opposition toward the socialist
regime. And yet, after Levi’s step forward, a number of scholars made a step back or two: his
historically and theoretically founded differentiation of novi film was followed by the crass and
inaccurate homogenization and disregard for the historical facts.
Consider the following example: writing about the films “that uncompromisingly
criticized various practices of the socialist society” in Yugoslavia from 1963 to 1972, Aida
Vidan illustrates them with the group of nine exemplary features that “were far from being
trumpeted as model achievements of the socialist film industry” (2011, p. 176). Unfortunately,
that claim contradicts the elemental facts. Out seven directors whom she enlists, only one was
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never awarded at the festival in Pula, the key Yugoslav cinematic event, whereas three of them
were awarded more than once. Out of the nine allegedly disfavored films, four won the main
prize, two won the second prize for directing, one won the special award for the “courageous
directing”, while two films did not enter the festival.
Vidan’s account thus pivots on the totalitarian-model premise that the “uncomprisingly”
critical films were by definition “far from being trumpeted as model achievements”. In reality,
however, these films garnered the highest critical acclaim throughout the 1960s, setting the
standards of great filmmaking. In other words, Vidan’s version simply does not correspond to the
historical dynamics of the critical and political reception of the novi film works: e.g., one and the
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same critic would hail Kad budem mrtav i beo/When I Am Dead and Pale in 1968 as Živojin
Pavlović’s master piece, and the following year he would lambast the next film of the same
director as shamefully inferior to its precursor (Čolić, 1970). It appears that Vidan sees only the
latter type of criticism, and projects it back in the past, erasing the generally venerable status of
the novi film authors altogether.
However, the most symptomatic of the Art-pole homogenization of the Yugoslav modern
cinema is the recent focus on the so-called Yugoslav “black wave” (e.g. DeCuir, 2011; DeCuir,
2012; Kirn, Sekulić and Testen 2012). For a long time the key term in designation of Yugoslav
modern cinema in the 1960s was novi film, which was used principally to mark a period of
innovation and openness, and celebrate the variety of the auteurist styles. The “black wave”,
however, is a narrower and more problematic term that aims to delimit a set of specific aesthetic
characteristics shared by some novi film authors with allegedly a common ideological platform.
The most problematic about the “black wave” label is its history. In the late 1960s and early
1970s, it operated as the deragotory etiquette under which the mainstream critics and the party
nomenklatura heavily critivized several films and harangued their authors; some of the films
under attack were banned and shelved, whereas one filmmaker was imprisoned. Since the label
had been imposed on them in such an appaling way, the filmmakers never accepted it as a valid
aesthethical category and identified with it. Thus, although fairly used as the colloquial
expression for the politically sanctioned films, the “black wave” label was not elevated into a
proper aesthetical category in the most of the scholarship on Yugoslav cinema (Jovanović,
2011).
In the last five years, however, the novi film designation took the second seat, as the
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scholars started to privilege the label “black film”. Attempting to define its aestethical and
ideological differentia specifica, they prefer to neglected that “The term ‘Black Wave’ has less to
do with what these films have in common than with how they have been received” (RavettoBiagioli, 2012, p. 91). One thesis became particularly popular: in a society dominated by
corrupted version of socialist ideology, the “black film” was expression of the authentic,
antidogmatic socialism. According to Greg DeCuir, the “black wave” cinema was supposed to
“play its part in realizing the ‘socialist paradise’ that Tito was intent to creating – though perhaps
their vision of that paradise and how to realize it differed from the official opinion” (2011, p.
27); hence, “Black Wave filmmakers sought to set up the conditions in which reality could be
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grasped so it can be criticized, criticized so it can be changed and changed so it can aspire to
improve” (2011, p. 37). In the same vein, Gal Kirn argues that the “black film” “attempted to
strengthen socialism, to criticize it from within and at the same time to rethink what socialist art
should be” (2012, p. 20). Boris Buden is even more specific: “The Black films in fact are an
artistic response to the introduction of a market economy in the former socialist Yugoslavia
during the late 1950s and early 60s [...] They constitute a reaction to the first symtpoms of the
emergence of post-industrial modes of production, an early cultural announcement of the coming
neo-liberal turn in the global economy” (2008). As we can see, in these accounts the Yugoslav
regime shifts from being too dogmatic to effectively pro-capitalist, and yet the “black wave” is
always defined strictly in terms of its opposition to it. In other words, although there is no clear
consensus as of what makes the regime the villainous, there is a clear consensus that the “black
wave” filmmakers are the good guys due their leftist ideological attachments.
These rhetorics superbly illustrate how the homogenizing, totalitarian-model logic
suffuses even the work of scholars who are otherwise a far cry from being the advocates of the
totalitarian paradigm. For example, Buden and Kirn, the formidable left academics in a Marxist
tradition, are never tired to criticize the notion of totalitarianism. However, it appears that they
do not realize that at the same time they stick to its main priniciple: they homogenize the “black
wave” by first and foremost defining it as oppositional to the supreme ideological agency. A
leftist critic myself, I understand their strategic decision to read the “black wave” films as “a
radical critique, not of communism, but of post-communism” (Buden, 2008). However, an apt
critique of ideology does not necessarily make good cinema history: their accounts are often
insufficient, incongruent and misguiding, to say the least.
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For example, Kirn, Sekulić and Testen (2012) argue that the filmmakers who were
harangued under the “black wave” label eventually appropriated that name. But when exactly did
that appropriation happen and who are the artists in question? The filmmakers certainly did use
the term in everday parlance, as a colloquial label, but there is no a major evidence that they
adopted the term for designating their own aesthetics. For example, in the very same volume
Žilnik explicitely states that he did not appropriate the term but ridiculed it: “The fact that I could
mock the label [...] shows that the black movement never existed as a genuine movement. The
differences between the authors who were eventually expelled under the same label were
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substantial” (Kirn, Sekulić and Testen, 2012, p. 96).38 Also, the recently proposed selections of
the “black wave” films and authors seem utterly arbitrary and unsystematic: the works and
filmmakers who had never been marked as the “black” all of a sudden are turned into the
exemplary “black” auteurs, whereas those who actually had been attacked under the “black
wave” banner are marginalized (Šijan, 2011).
2.2.3. Differentiating the “black wave”
If we are to, as Foucaut would have it, put an end to the great divide of Yugoslav cinema, the
dissolution of its “black” Art pole seems as a significant, indeed inescapable move. Its first step
should include giving up on the notion that the “black wave” was substantially defined by the
genuine socialist, Marxist commitment of the filmmakers who were disappointed “with the
fading away of revolutionary ideals” (Kirn and Madžar, 2013, pp. 67–68). Slobodan Šijan’s
criticism of DeCuir is the most pertinent in that regard:
Although it is not impossible to imagine some of the Black Wave filmmakers (for instance the
self-declared leftist Želimir Žilnik or the always-curious Dušan Makavejev) reading or least
leafing through Praxis, it is a bit more difficult to imagine any of the directors whom DeCuir
easily lines among the “committed socialists” inspired by ideas from Praxis and rushing to shoot
a film meant to “play its part in realizing the “socialist paradise” that Tito was intent on creating”,
as he concludes.
(2011, p. 12)
Šijan’s reference to Žilnik cuts to the heart of the problem. It is as if the recent scholarly
accounts define the “black wave” by deducing its main traits from ideology and aesthetics of
Žilnik, as the key leftist figure of “black wave”. Indicative in that regard is DeCuir’s utterly
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arbitrary claim that Žilnik’s “Early Works has a central position within Yugoslav Black Wave”
(2011:191). For all Žilnik’s creditentials, however, to treat his ideological choice as differentia
specifica of the “black film” at large, is to fall prey to a crass generalization. Hence the thesis
that “black wave” films were “not critique for the sake of critique [...] or ‘cheap’ antitotalitarianism suggesting that Socialism would ultimately lead to the absence of freedom” (Kirn
and Madžar, 2013, p. 68), should finally be replaced with the acknowledgment of the fact that
some of the “black films” could be seen as self-indulgent criticisim, and – why not? – as antisocialist and dissident along the lines of the totalitarian-thesis. Or, to quote Šijan again, the many
38
See also Pavlović (1996, pp. 300–301).
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“black films” “were not only ‘critical’ of the system but were also honest condemnations of the
essence of socialist revolution in Yugoslavia and the state it had created” (Šijan, 2011, p. 13).
Such a desacralization of the ideological motivation behind the “black wave” would also
enable us to stop using the “black wave” canon for diminishing the critical capacity of the other
segments of Yugoslav cinema. A recent article by Benjamin Halligan (2011) on the films of the
“Sarajevo documentary school” (SDS) offers the most extreme case of that strategy. The works
of Vlatko Filipović, Vefik Hadžismajlović, Suad Mrkonjić, Petar Ljubojev, and other filmmakers
who made documentaries in the 1960s and 1970s for Sutjeska Film were, according to Halligan,
nothing short of Stalinist. Although Halligan’s misleading account begs for an extensive counterargument, let me here address only what I see as its main faultline.
Reacting to the fact that some people did not deem the SDS films Stalinist propaganda,
but actually anti-authoritarian, critical, and ironic (e.g. Stevens, 2009), Halligan argues that
ascribing such dissent and subversion into different films made in socialism is untenable:
Did Mrkonjić and Hadžismajlović, then, smuggle in dissent, while Filipović engaged in cinémavérite? Such an auteurist approach to cold war Eastern European and Russian cinema tends to eek
out dissenting elements to prove the presence of a guiding and individual – and individual’s –
intelligence. [According to that approach] the connection between the auteur as an individual,
freethinking intellectual and his or her therefore automatic condemnation of the realities of
existing socialism is automatic.
(2011, pp. 212–213)
The implication that “a guiding and individual – individual’s – intelligence” is absent from the
SDS films I find appallingly condescending. Although the rest of the argument suggests that
Halligan criticizes the use of an auteurist approach in Eastern Europe as such, the rest of the
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article shows otherwise. Not only does Halligan express an absolute praise for the Yugoslav
auteurs like Makavejev and Žilnik, but he also actually derogates the SDS films precisely by
contrasting them with the most venerable novi film/“black wave” works. Hence, in comparison
with the SDS films, “[t]he sophistication of the Novi Film and the subsequent Black Wave [...]
seems from another time and country together;” the SDS peasants and the rapist peasants in
Early Works “could not be more different”; even when the SDS films and Pavlović’s films show
virtually the same social conditions, “the very tenor is entirely different”; the sexologist from
Makavejev’s Love Affair “seems to satirize the heavy-handed didacticism of films such as those
of the SDS, and the satire of Tito’s personality cult in Innocence Unprotected skewers exactly
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the kind of communal adoration of Tito seen in [Mrkonjić’s] Facades” (Halligan, 2011, pp. 211–
212).
All these comparisons testify that one can still comfortably ascribe criticism,
subversiveness and satire (and a bit of the individual and the individual’s intelligence, I guess),
but only to those directors whose auteur status had been established as incontestable before the
demise of socialism. Apparently, the gates of the pantheon of Eastern European auteurs now
should be closed: the rules applied to those already inside must not be applied to any new
candidates. A more shocking display of the persistence of “the epistemological parameters of the
Cold War world order,” as Imre would have it, I can hardly imagine.
Halligan’s strategy thus boils down to upholding the Artist vs. Regime dichotomy, as
embodied in the “black wave” vs. the SDS opposition. However, that juxtaposition comes with a
price: one important author is tellingly absent from Hallingan’s account. It is Bato Čengić, the
most lauded novi film author from Sarajevo, whose work was also affected by the “black wave”
harangue. Famous for his feature films Mali vojnici/Playing Soldiers (1967), Uloga moje
porodice u svjetskoj revoluciji/The Role of My Family in the World Revolution (1971), and Slike
iz života udarnika/Scenes from the Life of Shock-Workers (1972), Čengić also made some of the
exemplary SDS documentaries: Čovjek bez lica/Man Without a Face (1961), Ljudi sa rijeke/The
River People (1961), Krilati karavani/The Winged Caravans (1961), and Život je lijep/Life is
Beautiful (1976). As the lynchpin between novi film and SDS, Čengić testifies that the two are
hardly clear-cut opposites, i.e. that they cannot incarnate the “Art vs. Propaganda” dichotomy. If
Halligan had introduced Čengić in his article, he would have sabotaged its underlying
totalitarian-model logic. Hence, instead of explaining what a dissenting figure like Čengić does
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in the company of the Stalinist didacts, Halligan has conveniently erased any trace of Čengić
from the SDS brethren.
When Halligan warns that the SDS films should not be read straightforwardly along
dissenting lines, I cannot agree more. However, I believe that a crucial addition must be
made: just as they are not to be easily read as Stalinist ilk. In other words, we should finally try
to grasp these films beyond the totalitarian-model logic, by developing a penchant for nuances
that would dissolve many preconceived notions about seemingly monadic and irreconcilable
elements that are paired in these dichotomies. Then it would be easier to grasp that Čengić is by
no means the only link between the SDS and the “black wave.” With the three documentaries
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produced by Sutjeska Film in the early 1960s, Makavejev is also a SDS fellow traveler; Žilnik
appreciated the work of Vlatko Filipović; the films of Petar Ljubojev look like the pastiches of
something that Branko Vučićević might have written. The opposition between the tenors of the
SDS and of the “black wave” should be replaced with more refined analyses that would question
the homogeneity of each of these two “tenors”.
Finally, by giving up on the fetish of the “black wave”, the post-Yugoslav leftist film
scholars would challenge the notorious divide between high art and popular culture. Alhough the
criticism of that divide has been developed some time ago within the broad field of leftist theory,
it remains curiously unnoticed by the recent accounts of Yugoslav cinema, which, inadvertently
for the most part, remain focused on the auteurist master pieces.39 That way, the scholars neglect
many film that tackled the burning social issues of the Yugoslav socialism (unemployment,
migration, etc.), but were not part of novi film or “black wave”; in that way, they remain
relegated to the party-hack underworld. However, one could argue that some of those films even
more directly tackled the socio-political problems of Yugoslav socialism than some “black
wave” masterpieces: for example, Po isti poti se ne vračaj/Don’t Come Back by the Same Road,
(1965, Jože Babič) addressed the antagonisms between the Yugoslav developed North (Slovenia)
and underdeveloped South (Bosnia and Herzegovina) in a direct way that was unprecedented in
Yugoslav cinema, including novi film. The similar could be said for the unemployment of
women in Three Hours for Love, the economic emigration in Sunce tudjeg neba/Sun of the
Strangers’ Sky (1968, Milutin Kosovac), and the illegal nomadic farming in Ovčar/Shepherd
(1971, Bakir Tanović). Although these features do not meet the aesthetic standards of the most
praised novi film works, their conventional privilege of narrative over visual experiments
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certainly helped them to convey the sense of urgency in relation to many social problems to the
wide audience nevertheless.
2.3.
Gender apparatus in Yugoslav socialism
2.3.1. The totalitarian gender trouble
39
For the most elaborated account on the epistemological challenges of research of the popular culture in the
Yugoslav socialism, see Senjković (2008).
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Now we can return to Foucault by stressing the crucial role that gender and sexuality played in
his epistemological developments. Although he had started articulating his concept of power in
Discipline and Punish (1991), it seems that only with his inquiry into knowledge of sexuality he
reached the most concise and astute articulation. The topic of “discipline and punish” is firmly
embedded in the field of jurisprudence and the monarch/state sovereignty, inviting the notion of
the Law as not more than the expression of the supreme Agency (Monarch, State). However, the
topic of sexuality enabled Foucault to move away from the field of official legislative as the
exemplary top–down vector of power, and to display a much more complex field of power
vectors, in which the official legislative does not have such an overwhelming, dominating effect
as it has in imprisonment. In other words, whereas the inquiry into the prison system structurally
fitted the descending type of analysis, the vicissitudes of gender and sexuality provided Foucault
with a convenient field in which the descending analysis does not suffice, for they are so
complex that they cannot be reduced to manifestation of the supreme Agency.
That being said, it is telling that some of the post-Yugoslav advocates of the totalitarian
paradigm pursue the descending optics of gender and sexuality in socialism, arguing that they
were substantially shaped by the Yugoslav totalitarian regime.40 Let me illustrate this with regard
to a specific issue to which I will return in the thesis’ final chapter: the status of male
homosexuality in the socialist Yugoslavia and its cinema. Again, I draw on an account that is
articulated in concert with the totalitarian paradigm. This one comes from Belgrade film critic
Zoran Janković, who claims that the representations of the “sexual minorities”/homosexuals in
Yugoslav cinema reveal the nefarious character of the socialist regime:
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since the sexual acts between people of same sex were officially decriminalized only in the
beginning of the 1990s, sexual minorities in Serbian/Yugoslav film were reduced to mere
inconspicuous details, to a caricature-style contribution to the vividness of the film story.
The all-around, general conspiratorial silence on that issue would be shattered only in a
rare, usually discriminatory episode, which would insinuate that out there cruise different freaks,
of suspicious and degenerate sexual orientation. […] Here and there in rare films would be a hint
at those who are sexually different […], however, following the pressure of the strong paw of the
state under which they created, the film directors persistently refused to make sexual minorities
visible in Serbian film [in socialism]. The situation was no better within the Socialist Federative
Republic of Yugoslavia or within Eastern Europe. [That] throws a huge shadow on what has now
become a staple position […] which postulates the late “great” Yugoslavia as the socialist
40
Truth to be told, to the best of my knowledge, no major gender-inflected analysis of Yugoslav socialism has
been produced within the totalitarian framework. One of the reasons for this is the fact that the feminist and gender
theories are hardly favored by the post-Yugoslav advocates of the totalitarian paradigm.
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paradise on Earth, the eternal spring of progress, and somehow safely nested on the very edge of
the Iron Curtain, albeit on the better, right, side of it.
pošto je istospolni seksualni čin zvanično dekriminalizovan tek početkom devedesetih, seksualne
manjine su u srpskom/jugoslovenskom filmu bile svedene tek na neupadljiv detalj, na
karikaturalni doprinos živopisnosti filmske priče.
Sveopštu zavereničku tišinu o tom pitanju poremetila bi tek poneka, mahom
diskriminatorska epizoda, koja bi šapatom nagovestila da tamo negde vršljaju drugačije spodobe,
upitne i nakaradne seksualne orijentacije. […] Tu i tamo bi se kroz neki film provukla kakva
naznaka o postojanju seksualno drugačijih […], ali filmski autori su, prateći mustru države pod
čijom šapom su stvarali, istrajno odbijali da seksualne manjine učine vidljivom stavkom u
srpskom filmu. Stvari ništa bolje nisu stajale ni u okvirima SFRJ ili na nivou istočnoevropskog
regiona […]. [To] baca ogromnu senku na sada već uvreženo mišljenje, […] po kojem je pokojna
“velika” Jugoslavija bila socijalistički raj na zemlji, nepresušni izvor naprednjaštva i nekako
bezbedno ugneždena na samoj ivici gvozdene zavese, ali ipak s bolje, one ispravne strane.
(2008, p. 188)
Unfortunately, already the elemental historical data contradict Janković. First, his reference to
criminalization is conveniently vague. To begin with, the Yugoslav law did not criminalize
homosexuality as such, but only male-to-male sex relations. According to the very first legal act
that treated same-sex acts in socialist Yugoslavia, Paragraph 186 of the Criminal Code from
1951, the man who would engage in the “unnatural acts” would be sentenced up to two years in
prison. The maximum sentence was reduced to one year of prison in 1959, and in 1970s the
paragraph was put out of force in half of the federal units (republics of Slovenia, Croatia,
Montenegro, and the autonomous province Vojvodina). Second, one should not forget that in the
early post-WWII period before the passage of Paragraph 186, the Yugoslav courts prosecuted the
male-to-male “unnatural acts” by applying the penal code of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, which
stipulated five years of incarceration under maximum security. The proper historical perspective,
thus, transforms Paragraph 186 from the unambiguous proof of the inherent homophobia of the
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Yugoslav totalitarianism into the first step towards the gradual loosening of the legal status of
homosexuality in socialism.
However, the Foucauldian point here would be that it is not enough to challenge Janković
by revealing the true facts about Yugoslav jurisprudence; far more important than that would be
deprivileging the jurisprudence altogether. Indeed, one of Foucault’s most significant
epistemological dicta was the dethroning of the law-as-prohibition in historical analysis. He
argued that jurisprudence should be treated as one mechanism of power among many others:
“The form of law with its effects of prohibition needs to be resituated among a number of other,
non-juridical mechanisms. [T]he penal system should not be analysed purely and simply as an
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apparatus of prohibition and repression of one class by another, nor as an alibi for the lawless
violence of the ruling class” (Foucault, 1980, p. 141). In order to deprivilege the law, Foucault
introduced the concept of “apparatus [dispositif]”, as “a thoroughly heterogeneous ensemble
consisting of discourses, institutions, architectural forms, regulatory decisions, laws,
administrative measures, scientific statements, philosophical, moral and philanthropic
propositions – in short, the said as much as the unsaid […] The apparatus itself is the system of
relations that can be established between these elements” (1980, p. 194). To analyze the
apparatus, then, is to identify and explore this constellation which is necessarily dynamic: the
elements are in constant ferment, shifting in positions, establishing among themselves ever new
and complex relations, and accordingly modifying their own functions.
This thesis argues that we should use the same apparatus-oriented type of inquiry in
relation to the issues of gender and sexuality in Yugoslav socialism. More specifically, as I
asserted in the introduction, I propose that the relation between cinema/popular culture and
gender/sexuality should be analyzed by means of the apparatus framework. Since I have already
tackled the status of homosexuality in socialist Yugoslavia in the previous subchapter, let me
further that issue in order to along the Foucauldian lines. At its most elementary, it means that
instead of foregrounding Paragraph 186, as paradigmatic example of law-as-prohibition, we
should bring in some more elements that contributed to, generally speaking, the apparatus of
sexuality – and, more specifically, of homosexuality – in socialist Yugoslavia. In the following
subchapter I will tackle what I see as one of the most important of these elements.
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2.3.2. Everything you always wanted to know about sex(ology) in Yugoslavia
You are surely interested in sexuality. And it is good that you are interested. It would be a pity if
you were not interested! I am also interested in sexuality, quite strongly. Of course, as the object
of research. Sexuality is, maybe, far more whispered about than it is talked about. But we don’t
know enough about the things about which we whisper or talk and write secretly. If we found that
out, we would see out how immensely is the humanity interested in sexuality.
Vi se sigurno interesujete za seksualnost. I dobro je što se interesujete. Žalosno bi bilo da se ne
interesujete! I ja se interesujem za seksualnost, vrlo živo. Razume se, kao za objekat proučavanja.
O seksualnosti se možda mnogo više šapuće nego što se govori. Ali o onome što se šapuće i što se
krišom priča i piše, mi dovoljno ne znamo. Tek kad bismo to saznali, videli bismo koliko je
interesovanje čovečanstva za seksualnost veliko.
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This is the address that opens Makavejev’s Love Affair (1967): an older man in a suit and bow tie
speaks directly to us, breaking the fourth wall, as he stands in his cabinet (FIGURE 2.1). The
subtitles introduce him as “Dr Aleksandar Dj. Kostić, author of Medicinske seksologije [Medical
Sexology] and trilogy Polno saznanje [The Sexual Knowledge]”, the gray eminence of the
Yugoslav sexology. Following the title with the question “Will a man be reformed? Will that
new man keep some old organs? [Hoće li biti reforme čoveka? Hoće li novi čovek zadržati neke
stare organe?]”, Kostić’s address does not leave room for doubt that the “organs” in case are
actually genitalia. The scientific research of sexuality, as something that remains insufficiently
known, thus should be integral to the socialist reform of the man.
FIGURE 2.1 Yugoslav sexologist Aleksandar Kostić in Love Affair (1967)
However, that does not mean that sexology in Yugoslavia can be simply reduced to the
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imperative of construction of the socialist New Man, i.e. to a doctrine that was exclusively or
dominantly rooted in the most pragmatic intentions of the nomenklatura. Authors who assume
that Love Affair merely mocks with Kostić’s speech as with didactic pseudo-scientific expertise
characteristic of socialism (Goulding, 1994, p. 224; Halligan, 2010, pp. 211–212), miss that
Makavejev is intrigued by the contemporary science as such, and not only its socialist variant.
Makavejev’s irony is a symptom of his ambivalence with regard to the efforts of the scientific
modernity to penetrate into the soul of tha man, as confirmed by the filmmaker’s constant
returning to sexology in W.R.: Misterije organizma/WR: Mysteries of the Organism (1971), and
Sweet Movie (1974). That way Makavejev’s films show that the sexology in socialist Yugoslavia
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functioned as the synecdoche of the global sexual modernity, and not as an endemic
phenomenon strictly determined by some presupposed ideological differentia specifica of the
Yugoslav socialism.
Sexology in Yugoslavia encompassed a plethora of heterogeneous discourses that,
circulating in a range of publications, elaborated on the issues of sexual development, types of
sexuality, marriage, pregnancy, contraception, abortion, sexual education, history of sexual
habits, “the psychology of the sexes”, etc. Love Affair illustrates this interdisciplinary plurality
with three of Kostić’s speeches, each of them framed in different discourse: in the first address,
he talks about history (the worship of phallus in Babylon and the ancient Egypt), in the second
about the biological base of sexuality (after he takes out an egg out of chicken coop), and,
finally, about the sexual motifs in the arts (especially in paintings). In his afterword to the
Yugoslav translation of A History of Sexual Customs by Richard Lewinshon a.k.a. Morus,
Lavoslav Glasinger praised the modern sexology for encompassing “not only physicians, such as
physiologists, embryologists, endocrinologists, gynecologists, psychiatrists and psychoanalysts,
but also zoologists, philosophers, psychologists, pedagogues, jurists, ethnologists, sociologists,
cultural historians, statisticians, and even theologians [ne samo liječnike, i to samo fiziologe,
embriologe, endokrinologe, venerologe, ginekologe, psihijatre, psihoanalitičare i higijeničare,
nego i zoologe, filozofe, psihologe, pedagoge, pravnike, etnologe, sociologe, kulturne
historičare, statističare, pa čak i teologe]” (1959, p. 420).
However, there is more to this phenomenon that the disciplinary plurality. The Yugoslav
sexological collage did not include only different scientific discourses, but also combined – as
Foucault would have it – scientia sexualis and ars erotica, atlases of anatomy and Figurae
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veneris, the edition “Brak i porodica [The marriage and the family]” published by The Workers
University and Kama Sutra, the traditional folk songs with the erotic motifs and Eroticism by
Georges Battaille. It was hardly a coincidence, then, that Branko Vučićević, one of the most
important screenwriters of novi film, translated in Serbo-Croatian David Reuben’s bestseller
Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex in the early 1970s.41
Sex, however, was not only subject of science and arts, but also the news, spectacle,
gossip, scandal. Beside the book volumes, the Yugoslav montage of the sexological attractions
41
In Rani radovi/Early Works (1969, Želimir Žilnik), for which Vučićević also wrote screenplay, we see a
“sexological” scene in which Jugoslava, the main female protagonist, teaches non-educated, illiterate peasant
women about the sexual life.
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includes also the press, from the daily papers to weeklies and women magazines to the protopornographic outlets. In one and the same magazine one can find articles on unwanted pregnancy
or the rape as the social problems, the reportages about the love life of Italians or Swedes, the
sensationalist bits about sex-bomb, the medical advice about menopause and fimosis, translations
of the bestsellers about the marriage and sex life, and the photos of nude beauties. The
imperative of the sexual education went hand in hand with the market laws. The sex was the
topic about which one had a lot to find out but at the same time the topic on which one could
make a lot of money.
Already this sketch shows that sexology in Yugoslav socialism offers a vivid illustration of
the cultural revolution in Jamesonian sense. We cannot simply equate it with the works written in
socialist Yugoslavia only, for it also included those from the Western Europe and the US, and
those from the pre-revolutionary epoch. Love Affair visually codes Kostić as someone coming
from pre-socialist epoch: that he is more of a stereotypical “gentleman” than a stereotypical
“comrade”, should not come as surprise for he got his education and gained most of his symbolic
capital as a sexologist already in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia (e.g. Kostić, 1936). In any case, the
canonical authors from the late nineteenth and the first half of the twentieth century—“those
avatars of sexual enlightenment [who] worked to build a science of desire, a new continent of
knowledge that would reveal the hidden keys to our nature” (Weeks, 1985, p. 63)—functioned as
the hard core upon which the Yugoslav sexologists were building. A telltale detail: if one is to
judge popularity of a book by the number of editions, the most popular book in Yugoslavia about
marriage and marital sexual life was by no mean some socialist handbook, but Savršeni brak
[Ideal Marriage], the bestseller from the 1920s penned by Dutch physician Theodor Hendrik van
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de Velde (1955). The book had captivated the Yugoslav audience already before WWII, and not
even the drastic socio-political change shattered its domination in the Yugoslav bookshops and
librairies.
The sexological discourse in Yugoslavia disregarded not only the historical barrier toward
the pre-socialist epoch, but also the Cold War divide. Publishers were up-to-date with
publications from the West, and their instant translations outnumbered the domestic sexological
publications by the late 1950s. Some voices argued that the socialist Yugoslavia was more of a
natural milieu for the progressive sexual knowledge of the liberal sexologist like Alfred Kinsey
than the puritan capitalist America itself. The foreword to the 1955 translation of G. Lombard
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Kelly’s Sexual Feeling in Married Men and Women (1951) boasted that the Yugoslav edition
included even those chapters that were omitted from the original edition “due to the legislature
and religious prejudices of the publishing houses in America [zbog zakonskih propisa i religioznih
predrasuda izdavačkih kuća u Americi]” (Vukadinović, 1955, p. 2).
In any way, the Yugoslav sexology and its publishing infrastructure saw themselves as a
part and parcel of the global sexual modernity, assuming that the knowledge about gender and
sexuality should pay no heed for the West–East rift, or for the narrow ideological constraints.
Due to this heterogeneity in terms of ideological and historical background of the sexual
knowledge, the sexology in Yugoslavia remains the ultimate proof that the sexual education in
the socialism had the structure of cultural revolution in Jamesonian sense: the sexual life of one
person could have been simultaneously, or in different stages of her life, been shaped by, say, the
traditional, rural customs and beliefs, the socialist doctrine about gender equality, the notions of
female sexuality from the early 20th century psychoanalysis, and the prescriptions about
fullfiling sexual life in marriage, coming from the post-WWII America.
Thus, in response to the opening question from Love Affair, we could say that not only that
the reformed, New Woman and Man of socialism have kept their old organs, but they also kept
the old, pre-revolutionary ways and discourses about sexuality, while simultaneously adopting
the new yet non-socialist ones (e.g., the liberal US sexology). The Yugoslav socialist modernity
thus does not deliver any substantial proof of some supposedly autochtonous, distinct socialist
discourse on gender and sexuality. The sexual knowledge that circulated the socialist Yugoslavia
was assembled from a way too many and variegated sexual discourses to assert any notion of
originality in terms of its content.
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However, although the Yugoslav apparatus of sexuality did not produce any revolutionary
new particular knowledge, something about it definitely was revolutionary and new: a sheer
scope of the dissemination of the sexual knowledge. The mandatory elementary education, the
rise of literacy, the development of the universal health care, the proliferation of media that
conveyed the sex- and gender-related knowledges and values – all of these were simply
unprecedented in the history of the Yugoslav peoples. Arguably the biggest achievement of the
socialist sexual modernity was, then, not simply the novelty or originality of some particular
sexual knowledge, but an unheard-of accessibility of that knowledge for virtually everyone.
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2.3.3. The apparatus at work: Male homosexuality in Yugoslav sexology...
Going back to the issue of homosexuality, one notices that the numerous sexological publications
discussed it, by offering to the public heterogenous, sometimes mutually contradicting and
exclusive information and views, which usually framed homosexuality in terms of social
(un)acceptability. Of course, it goes without saying that the dominant streams in sexology were
heteronormative to the extent that they never questioned the status of heterosexual family with
children as both most fundamental and most supreme social achievement. And yet, that
heterosexual privilege does not mean that all Yugoslav sexologists condemned homosexuality as
something that warrants punishment, prevention or therapy. Moreover, some very influential
authors directly opposed to judicial discrimantion of “unnatural acts” among men, and thus, one
can suppose, contributed to the relaxation and the abolition of Paragraph 186.
Consider, for example, Nikola Palić’s Polni život [The Sex Life], the first sexological
bestseller in socialist Yugoslavia.42 At first sight, there is nothing surprising: homosexuality is
addressed in the fifth part of the book on “Deviations of sexual life”, in the chapter “The inverted
sexual drive (homosexualism)” (sic!), being preceded by those about “Historical overview”,
“Algolagnia” (on sadism and masochism), “Sexual symbolism” (on exhibitionism and fetishism),
and “Masturbation” (symptomatically, the longest one). Consider, however, the very opening
paragraph:
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Science has reached its verdict and today we can say that we have ended the part of the discussion
pertaining to the basic problem of inverted sexual drive that surrounded the question whether this
is a disease, degeneration, perversion or an innate drive, a “mistake” of the very nature. The
verdict is in favour of this latter view. The terminological confusion about the state that is
characteristic of two or three percent of the humanity, however, still goes on.
Nauka je izrekla svoju presudu i danas možemo reći da je priveden kraju onaj deo diskusije o
osnovnom problemu naopakog polnog nagona koji se vodio oko pitanja da li se radi o bolesti,
degeneraciji, perverziji ili o urođenom nagonu, o “omašci” same prirode. Presuda glasi u korist
ovog potonjeg gledišta. Zbrka pojmova o stanju kojim se odlikuje otprilike dva–tri otsto
čovečanstva ipak traje i dalje.
(Palić, 1960, p. 170)
That a doctor in a socialist country in the 1950s considered the dispute about homosexuality
resolved in its key point – that homosexuality is a non-pathological category – may at first
surprise us, for even today we are witnessing that the dispute is still as never-ending as it is
42
From 1953 to 1960, the volume had five editions with 52,000 copies total, setting an absolute record when it
comes to sexological literature in the 1950s.
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harsh, with stigma of social and individual pathology stil being tagged on homosexuality one
way or another.
To support his claim, Palić sums up the arguments of Magnus Hirschfield, Iwan Bloch and
Richard von Krafft–Ebing (more precisely, from Krafft–Ebing’s late work, criticizing his earliear
view that homosexuality is illness). He also warns that the mental disorders like excessive
anxiety or neurasthenics are not intrinsic to homosexuality, but are reaction to “abject, digusted
sentiment of the environment [odbijajuće, gadljivo držanje sredine]” towards homosexuals
(Palić, 1960, p. 174). To top it all, in the second part of the book, the chapters turn into a
polemical tour de force the addressee of which is explictely singled out: it is the Yugoslav
judiciary and its Paragraph 186.
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[O]ne cannot it deem it correct or scientifically justified when judiciary labels a biological
phenomenon as a vice or a crime, as our Criminal Code does. In no way can we accept that
paragraph as necessary, notwithstanding that such regulation is illogical and unclear in the first
place. First, it punishes “unnatural acts” only among men, without mentioning at all homosexual
acts among women. If we have taken such an unjust and not completely scientifically proven
position towards men, it is not understandable why it is deemed a sin only in men and not in
women. On the other hand, the very term “unnatural act” is unclear. For, this is understood to be
not only when a man inserts its member in anus of another man, that is pedication, but also any
act between the men that resembles an intercourse (that is, fellatio, inserting the member inbetween the thighs etc.), while mutual masturbation, anilingus and other perversions are not
punishable.
Neither this can be about defending some legal goods and public morality, because a
relation among adults cannot be a threat to personal freedom if mutually consensual, without
presence of the third person. However, if such an act is publically indecent, there is another
paragraph dealing with this.
Zato se ne može smatrati da je sasvim na svom mestu i da je naučno obrazloženo, kada
zakonodavstvo jednu biološku pojavu proglašuje za porok i zločin, kao što čini i naš krivični
zakonik. Ne možemo uopšte prihvatiti da je taj paragraf potreban, čak i bez obzira što je taj
zakonski propis već sam po sebi dosta nelogičan i nejasan. Prvo, on kažnjava “protuprirodnu blud”
samo među muškarcima, dok se homoseksualna aktivnost među ženama uopšte ne pominje. Ako
smo u pogledu muškaraca već zauzeli ovako nepravedno i ne sasvim naučno stanovište, onda nije
dovoljno razumljivo zašto je to kod muškaraca greh, a kod žene ne. S druge strane nije jasan ni
sam pojam “protuprirodnog bluda”. Naime, pod tim se podrazumeva ne samo to, kada muškarac
unosi svoj ud u čmar muškarca, dakle pedikacija, nego uopšte svaki čin među muškarcima koji
potseća na snošaj (dakle felacija, unošenje uda među butine itd.), dok uzajamo vršeno
zadovoljavanje, anilingus i druge perverzije nisu kažnjive.
Ne može biti reči ni o odbrani nekih pravnih dobara i javnog morala, jer veza odraslih ljudi
ne može da ugrožava ličnu slobodu kada se vrši na osnovu međusobnog sporazuma, bez prisustva
trećeg lica. Ako pak takav čin izaziva javnu sablazan, za to postoji drugi paragraf.
(Palić, 1960, p. 175)
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Warning that public indecency, rape and seduction of minors are already covered with separate
regulations, Palić argues that the murky concept of “unnatural act” blurs the line between these
crimes and homosexuality. He also reminds that criminal codes of many countries both in the
West and the East does not contain the “paragraph for homosexuals [paragraf za
homoseksualce]”, and concludes: “What causes homosexual urge has not been answered reliably
by science. Hence it is on us to understand naturally given essence of that phenomenon, without
deeming it an illness. For illness should be treated – and here no treatment could help [Šta
izaziva pojavu homoseksualnog polnog nagona, na to još nauka nije dala pouzdan odgovor. Naše
je da shvatimo od prirode datu suštinu te pojave, i da ne gledamo u njoj bolest. Bolest bi trebalo
lečiti – a ovde ne pomaže nikakvo lečenje]” (Palić 1960: 175, original emphasis). In the light of
these arguments, the chapter reads as the message to judiciary that it can and should change the
discriminating paragraph. At the very beginning of the chapter, Palić invokes the juristic
discourse: “Science has reached its verdict...” Apparently, the scientific verdict makes a sort of
precedent in favor of the criminalized group; the legal system thus should consider the scientific
verdict as a guideline before making new verdicts on its own. Although the scientific acquittal
might not be complete in all of its aspects (for we still do not know what generates
homosexuality), it should nevertheless be sufficient for abolishing the prosecution and
stigmatization of the homosexuals.
It should be noted that the fierce advocating of non-pathological nature of homosexuality
and abolition of legal discrimination of male homosexuals does not mean that Palić dismisses the
heteronormativity as such. On the contrary, he eventually describes homosexuality as “the
phenomenon with no natural sense and purpose [pojava bez prirodnog smisla i svrhe]”, while
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arguing that the “[n]atural role and vocation of the human [is] procreation [Prirodna uloga i
poziv čoveka [je] razmnožavanje]” (Palić, 1960, p. 175); he also asserts: “We acknowledge to a
homosexual as a human the right to survival and we have to understand him also as a sexual
individual, although the culture, the progress of humanity moves along the line of
heterosexuality [Mi priznajemo homoseksualcu kao čoveku pravo na opstanak i moramo ga
shvatiti i kao seksualnu jedinku, mada se kultura, napredak čovečanstva kreće po koloseku
heteroseksualnosti]” (Palić, 1960, p. 176). And yet, whether we interpret these claims as strategic
retreat after the explicit confrontation with the current legislation, or as Palić’s deeply personal
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conviction – or, why not, as both – that by no means diminishes the significance of the
aforementioned polemical refutation of Paragraph 186.
Not all Yugoslav sexologists shared the non-pathological view on homosexuality.
Exemplary in that regard are the views of Muradif Kulenović, the renowned psychiatrist from
Zagreb. In his 1986 study Metapsihologija, nastranosti, osobitosti [Metapsychology, Sexual
Deviances, Idiosincracies], in chapter “Homoseksualne neurotske osobine [Homosexual neurotic
features]”, Kulenović ruminates on the rise of the subculture of homosexuals in Yugoslav big
cities, and forecasts that the homosexuals will organize themselves more efficiently and have
increasing social demands: “We can be sure this will not end only in the erotic expressions
[Možemo biti sigurni da se neće zaustaviti samo na erotskim iživljavanjima]” (1986, p. 219). He
zeroes in on the rich and powerful homosexual elites: while these elites “do nothing to help that
these sexual inclinations to be treated [ništa ne čine da bi pomogli da se ovakve spolne
nakolnosti liječe]”, they endeavor to “change and improve the image of homosexuals, whilst
putting themselves in the role of protectors of endangered or prosecuted homosexuals [izmijene i
poboljšaju sliku o homoseksualcima i stavljaju se u zaštitu ugroženih ili protjerivanih
homoseksualaca]” and “[t]hey fiercely strive that each of them achieves the feeling of personal
pride without any fear of punishment and discrimination [Vatreno se bore da svaki od njih
postigne osjećaj osobnog ponosa bez strahovanja od kazni i diskriminacije]” (Kulenović, 1986,
p. 220). He opposes the demands for equality of homosexuals and heterosexuals: “We do not
know how advisable it is to support, and even less do we know how smart is to help and
encourage homosexuals to create exclusively erotic friendships and familial ties among
themselves or to associate in any capacity – from ‘marriage’ to the political parties [Ne znamo
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koliko je to uputno podržavati, a najmanje koliko je pametno pomagati i osnaživati da
homoseksualci međusobno stvaraju isključiva erotska prijateljstva i rodbinske veze i da se u
svim pravcima udružuju – od ‘braka’ do političkih stranki]” (Kulenović, 1986, p. 220). He also
holds that only heterosexuals can actually achieve such genuine romance, while the notion of
real love in homosexuals is a mere neurotic delusion, something that is untenable in reality.
And yet, more interesting than these negative views is the way how Kulenović developed
them. At one point he unexpectedly goes down the memory lane, revealing that in his youth he
held a rather different position on homosexuality. He recalls the episode back from his high
school days: after watching film The Trials of Oscar Wilde (1960, Ken Hughes), Kulenović was
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“profoundly shaken” by the poet’s incarceration as depicted onscreen. He could not fathom how
the society could so gravely besmirch Wilde’s relationship with the young boys:
I understood these as true friendships (what was in line with my age) and as Wilde’s need to see
and to love in his young friend his own bygone youthful days […]. I considered writing an essay
“Oscar Wilde, or, in defence of homosexuality”. I was encouraged by later encounters with the
works of Lillian Hellman, Tennessee Williams and others; the essay would probably be
dominated by the feeling of dissatisfaction caused by misunderstanding, prejudices and the vulgar
notions of people about everything that does not follow the script of ordinary, harsh and triedand-tested reality.
Shvaćao sam to kao prava prijateljstva (što je odgovaralo mojoj dobi) i potrebu Wildea da u
svojem mladom prijatelju vidi i voli svoju prošlu mladost […]. Razmišljao sam da napišem esej
“Oscar Wilde ili obrana homoseksualnosti”. Na to su me naveli i kasniji susreti s literaturom
Lillian Hellman, Tennesseeja Williamsa i drugih; u eseju bi vjerojatno prevladavao osjećaj
nezadovoljstva zbog nerazumijevanja, predrasuda i vulgarnih shvaćanja ljudi o svemu onome što
se ne odvija po scenariju standardne, grube u utabane stvarnosti.
(Kulenović, 1986, p. 257)
And yet, Kulenović’s subsequent education and professional development extinguished the
flames of youth: “In peace and solemnity of the medical offices, things start looking completely
different [U miru i ozbiljnosti liječničkih ordinacija stvari izgledaju sasvim drugačije]” (1986, p.
258). Consequently, his stance on homosexuality underwent an u-turn: “After all, that is a
deviation and the outcome of pathological processes in the family environment, and one should
do everything to prevent such a development as much as possible, whereas in fully developed
cases [one should] enable understanding instead of punishing and prosecution of those ultimately
misfortunate people [To je ipak devijacija i prozvod patoloških odnosa obiteljske sredine i treba
sve učiniti da se u što većoj mjeri spriječi takav razvoj, a u razvijenim slučajevima [...] da se
omogući i razumijevanje a ne kažnjavanje i progoni u krajnjem ishodu ipak nesretnih ljudi]”
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(Kulenović, 1986, p. 258).
The rest of Kulenović’s treatise, however, does not leave much room for doubts as for
what catalyzed his change of heart. Already in the first paragraph, as his very first reference, he
evokes the name that will dominate the rest of the chapter as the indisputable authority: it is
Irving Bieber, American psychiatrist whose extremely influential 1962 volume Homosexuality:
A Psychoanalytic Study lambasted Kinsey’s thesis that homosexuality and infantile bisexuality
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are natural and normal, and layed a cornerstone for the defamation of homosexuality as
psychopathological condition that psychiatry should cured.43
Kulenović’s example thus vividly illustrates that a far cry from being a hermetically
sealed retort filled with the distilled socialist doctrine, the Yugoslav sexology was substantially
shaped by the influences from the Western sexology (medicine, psychology). In opposition to the
totalitarian paradigm that equals the Eastern side of the Great divide with the backwardness and
gloom, and the Western one with progress and light, Kulenović demonstrates that the Western
influences could be detrimental as well. Coming after Palić, Bieber’s dogma on homosexuality
as pathology was certainly a major step back. Kulenović’s account conveniently illustrates how
the clash between “homophilic” and “homophobic” attitudes has travelled from the Western to
the Eastern side of the Cold War divide: Tenneesee Williams and Lillian Helman on one hand,
and Bieber and the anti-Kinsey backlash on the other, did not clash only in the USA, but also in
socialist Yugoslavia.
Let me wrap up this subchapter with a reference to the first book by a Yugoslav author
focusing exclusively on homosexuality, U okviru vlastitog spola [Within the frame of one’s own
sex] by Marijan Košiček, which was published the same year as Kulenović’s tretatise.44 This
paragraph cannot do the justice to Košiček as the best known and most fruitful Yugoslav
sexologist, but here will suffice suffice to say that his stances on homosexuality is opposed to
Kulenović. Claiming that prostitution, sexual violence, sexually transmitted diseases, and
incestuous abuse of the children are more frequently tied to heterosexuality, he concludes that “it
is not just that homosexuality is not a social evil, but is less harmful for society than
heterosexuality [homoseksualnost ne samo da nije neko društveno zlo, nego je po društvo čak
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manje štetna od heteroseksualnosti]” (Košiček, 1986, p. 303). His insight that “society can only
benefit from accepting and treating the sexual ties among people of same sex as the natural way
of sex life, equal to those of people of different sexes [društvo može imati samo koristi od toga
ako prihvati spolne veze među ljudima istoga spola kao prirodan oblik spolnoga života,
ravnopravan onome među osobama raznoga spola]” (Košiček, 1986, p. 305), results in a
proposal that the homosexual partners should be given right to marriage and having the children,
43
On Bieber’s study and its effects in the American public sphere, see Calhoun (2000, pp. 146–147), and Part II
in D’Emilio (1983).
44
The only prior book on homosexuality published in Yugoslavia was the translation of the Italian sexologist
Viglianedi-Rocca (1968).
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through adoption or birth. In the book’s coda, Košiček insists that all persons regardless of their
choice of sex partner can and should aim at achieving the utter interpersonal connection in the
ultimate erotic harmony: “That great life goal for all of us is the real sexual love [Taj veliki
životni cilj za svakoga od nas je prava spolna ljubav]” (1986, p. 307).
2.3.4 ... and in cinema
The cases of Palić, Kulenović, and Košiček thus tellingly show that the Yugoslav sexology was
an arena of a constant struggle among a plethora of concepts, norms, and values with regard to
homosexuality – the struggle that would most probably remain hidden and unknown if we
believe that the very existence of Paragraph 186 is but an indisputable evidence of homophobia
that is, supposedly, innate to the Yugoslav totalitarian regime. In order additionally to complicate
the picture of that struggle and defuse the notion of the Yugoslav totalitarian homophobia, let me
turn to Yugoslav cinema and its representations of homosexuality. Since I have already outlined
many of those in my article about “queering” of Yugoslav cinema (Jovanović, 2012), let me
offer here some new findings that I have come across while exploring the early classical
Yugoslav cinema, or, in other words, the socialist-realist films.
According to the totalitarian-model logic, in the socialist-realist films there could be no
place for homosexual and queer characters. The gist of the socialist gender order was the
heterosexual bond between the new man and the new woman, and the revolutionary change
aimed to expunge everything that would endanger that fundamental relation. Hence, just like in
Janković’s account, we could assume that the totalitarian Yugoslav regime (still in its Sovietstyle phase) and its marionette filmmakers (still soaked in socialist realism), surely did not screen
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any type of queer sexuality, or, if they did, then it must have been some pejorative,
discriminatory episode.
But how are we, then, to explain the case of the very first homosexual character – or,
should we say, the first character who is unambiguously coded as the homosexual – in Yugoslav
cinema? It was Tetka, one of the monks from the cloister, the principal setting of Bakonja fra
Brne/Monk Brne’s Pupil (1951, Fedor Hanžeković). The socialist-realist credentials of the film
are indisputable: the director himself boasted with them (Škrabalo, 1984, pp. 143–144). The film
intended to depict the social and class antagonisms in the late 19th century, with an emphasis on
the immorality and crookedness of the Church (the Catholic one in this particular case). Adapted
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from the eponymous anticlerical satire written in 1892, by the canon realist author Simo
Matavulj, the film follows Ivo, the young titular protagonist, as he arrives in a cloister to become
a monk, only to be slowly yet irreversibly corrupted by his mentor Brne and the rest of clergy,
which embody different mortal sins.45
At first, it seems that Tetka is just one clerical caricature among the others. His very
nickname – tetka means “aunt” – stereotypically suggests not only his sexual orientation, but a
certain feminized posture associated with it. When Tetka sees Ivo for the first time, his own face
glows, betraying his fascination with the boy. “And who is that new boy? [A tko je taj novi
dječak?]”, he asks the monastery cook, in a significantly soft voice that signalizes that he is
smitten by the newcomer; “Bravo! Bravo!”, he exclaims theatrically while gazing down at the
novice. The next time Tetka meets Ivo, the boy gets hit by another, capricious monk for no
reason. After seeing the injustice, Tetka approaches Ivo and, waving the flower in his hand, tells
him in a mild voice: “You should not be afraid of me, you know... [Mene se ne tribaš bojati,
znaš...]”, and gently “hits” him with a flower in a teasing way. As Tetka proceeds down the hall,
the camera shoots him from the back, capturing his feminized posture: he waves with his flower
and sways his hips. Another pupil mockingly imitates Tetka’s walk, while following him from a
safe distance.
And yet, the rest of the film warns us that this mocking representation of Tetka does not
amount to his vilification. The world surrounding Ivo is dominantly vile and corrupt, and the
ultimate proof of its wickedness is the lecherous life of the monks. Although they officially live
in celibacy, they indulge in the clandestine affairs with the local women. When Ivo himself
commits to such an affair, following the example of his mentor, the film suggests that he reached
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his moral nadir. Fra-Tetka, however, does not fit the profile of the licentious monk. Unlike the
heterosexual monk desire of the monks, which results in the secret romances which destroys the
life of the lovers, Tetka’s sexual desire is ultimately rendered benign.46
The key scene in the designation of Tetka’s queerness as a positive feature follows those
that established him as the laughing stock. After some drinking with his peers and napping in the
45
Although Daniel J. Goulding praised the film as “an effectively realized drama”, his summary is curiously
inaccurate. Not only that he unfathomably sets the film in Renaissance, but also argues that Ivo “learns to combine
spiritual progress with a discerning and lusty appreciation for worldly pleasures” (Goulding, 2002, p. 44) – a
misguiding remark given that the film insists that the clergy’s “lusty appreciations for worldly pleasures” is nothing
but a hypocrisy that excludes any true spirituality.
46
This is important to stress, as the monk’s sexual desire could also be deemed the paedophilic.
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monastery kitchen, Ivo – still an innocent, true believer – sneakily returns to his room late at
night. In the hallway in front of his room, he spots Tetka: under the cloak of darkness and
silence, the monk decorates the sculpture of the patron saint with flowers and lights the candle.
Hidden in the shadow, Ivo observes as Tetka leaves, while another monk shows up, and,
carefully, not to be noticed by Tetka, puts out the candle. Finally, when the other monk leaves,
Ivo brings the burning candle from his own room, lights Tetka’s candle again and piously looks
at the figure of the saint. The scene, thus, establishes Tetka as a genuinely devout believer:
surrounded and despised by the other monks who are blasphemy incarnated, he literally keeps
the flame of faith alive. In the eyes of the boy who is still a believer himself, Tetka appears as an
authentic role model, although the boy’s identification with corrupt monks will eventually
triumph. In other words, the candle scene unambiguously couples Tetka’s queerness with the
virtue, just as the rest of the film couples heterosexuality of the other monks with the vice. In the
film’s universe, where the corruption wins the day, Tetka thus appears as a quixotic figure that
guards the habits and values that are despised and betrayed by his rotten environment.
As we shall see in the following pages, Monk Brne’s Pupil is by no means the only early
classical Yugoslav film susceptible to the queer analysis, but I use it here as the most impressive
illustration that even a strong political control over filmmaking in the late 1940s and early 1950s
did not utterly erase queers motifs. Hence, we should analyze these celluloid images of nonnormative sexualities – just like the images of gender and sexuality in general – as a part and
parcel of the gender apparatus in socialist modernity, which encompassed many other discourses
and imaginaries (jurisprudence, sexology). Only that way can we get a better grasp of the gender
order of Yugoslav socialism, and stop the production of ignorance along the lines of the
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totalitarian model.
2.4.
Conclusion
As the totalitarian model continues to influence the historical accounts of the socialist
Yugoslavia, reducing numerous layers of socialist modernity to mechanisms and outcomes of the
ideological state repression, many accounts of Yugoslav cinema still follow the backlash suite.
They maintain the unbridgeable divide between cinema-as-propaganda and cinema-as-art, the
dichotomy which makes the core premise of the totalitarian model in the sphere of arts and
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culture. According to the advocates of the totalitarian model, the predominant purpose of
Yugoslav cinema was to brainwash the population, filling it with with ideological dogmas and
lies that justified the rule of Tito and the communist party. Accordingly, the rare exceptions to
this reign of propaganda in cinema were the auteurs whose films fiercely challenged the rule and
the values of the party, but at a high price: they were marginalized at best, terrorized and
imprisoned in the worst case scenario.
At its most paradoxical and malevolent, the dichotomous logic of the totalitarian model
has found its way even in the works of the leftist scholars who are otherwise very critical of it
and its influence in history-writing. These scholars do not assert that the filmmakers criticize the
socialist politics as innately totalitarian, yet still continue to define their filmmaking first and
foremost in opposition to the regime. In that way, these scholarly accounts involuntarily continue
to buttress the totalitarian model of Yugoslav cinema.
In order to challenge the fallacies stemming from the notion of Yugoslav cinema as a
totalitarian cinema, I argue for a “Foucauldian turn” in Yugoslav cinema studies. Historians and
theorists of Yugoslav cinema/film would do good to turn to Foucualt’s criticism of descending
type of historical analysis that privileges only one “supreme” social agency and “explains”
everything by referring to it. By doing so, we would challenge the Manichean narrative that
divides Yugoslav cinema into the two groups of filmmakers who are defined via rapport to the
Tito’s “totalitarian regime” as such a supreme social agency: the auteurs who are defined by their
opposition toward the Regime, and the party drones and sycophants who are supporting it.
Fundamental as it is, the replacement of the dichotomous picture of Yugoslav cinema
with the most differentiated one is only a first step toward more thorough re-articulation of
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research of relation between Yugoslav cinema and other spheres and aspects of the socialist
modernity. Foucault’s notion of apparatus enables us, first, to reconceptualize Yugoslav cinema
as a heterogeneous ensemble of discourses, institutions, and practices, which are not strictly
defined with regard to the supreme agency of political power (Tito, the regime, the party).
Second, it also designates Yugoslav cinema itself as one of many elements in other apparatuses
of Yugoslav socialism.
Due to the main focus of my research, I am especially interested in the beneficial effects
of the Foucauldian epistemological turn in relation to the links between Yugoslav cinema and the
broader apparatus of sexuality in socialism. First, the other elements of this apparatus (e.g.
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sexology) provide us with important contextual layers for analyzing gender motifs in Yugoslav
films. However, we should not forget that also goes vice versa. The following chapters
demonstrate how the specific films representations of gender and sexuality can throw more light
on – and sometimes even challenge – the other discourses, institutions, values and norms that
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make the apparatus of gender in Yugoslav socialism.
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Chapter 3
Challenging the “great divide”:
The gendered shades of the World War II/Partisan films
In the socialist Yugoslavia, World War II was universally deemed the most important sequence
in the national history. It caused devastating losses, both human and material: the estimated
number of the dead was somewhat above 1 million, the total demographic loss was almost twice
as many (Žerjavić, 1989), and seventy percent of economical infrastructure was ravished in the
country that had been economically and industrially underdeveloped already before the war
(Bilandžić, 1985, pp. 79–80). WWII also brought the full political eclipse to the Yugoslav state
in 1941, as the King Petar Karadjordjevic and Royal Yugoslav government left for an exile in
London, and the Axis powers divided the country. And yet, the period of unprecedented
suffering and disintegration was also a period of the country’s radical political redesign and reemergence under the guidance of the Yugoslav communists. From 1941 to 1945, the Party
tempered the new Yugoslav state in an astounding effort that combined both antifascist struggle
and socialist revolution. The partisans fought the occupation forces of Axis powers and the
quisling regimes (like the ustaša regime of the Independent State of Croatia), just as the forces
that stood for the pre-war regime (the royalist četnik movement). In 1943, the Allies
acknowledged the partisans as the only genuine antifascist movement in the Yugoslav territories,
providing the communists with the much needed military support, and paving the way for the
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eventual recognition of the new socialist Yugoslavia.
Such a turbulent and ambiguous historical legacy made the films set in WWII and often
labelled the “partisan films” one of the most persistent staples of Yugoslav cinema.47 They made
47
The terminological tension between “the WWII film” (hereafter also: the war film) and “the partisan film”
points to the instability of this group of films as genre. First, not all WWII films have the partisans as their main
protagonists, i.e. do not fit the partisan genre in a more narrow sense, and yet are conveniently or habitually labeled
that way. For example, in his analysis of Ne okreći se sine/Don’t Turn Round, Son (1956, Branko Bauer), Nikica
Gilić remarks that although the partisans are virtually invisible in the film, it, nevertheless, remains customary
branded simply as “the partisan film” and not as a war thriller or melodrama, which, strictly speaking, would be
more accurate (2010, p. 81). Second, we should also acknowledge the volatility of the line between WWII films and
non-WWII films, which makes it impossible to firmly establish their definite number. For example, in
Koncert/Concert (1954, Branko Belan), the frame story is set in the post-war days, but most of the film consists of
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between one quarter and one third of the total number of feature films made from 1947 to 1992.
Scattered across a variety of sub-genres and ranging from the utterly schlock to the master
pieces, they are illustrative of virtually every aesthetical and ideological development in
Yugoslav cinema. Consequently, they remain a significant repository of gender and sex-related
motifs, some of which will be explored in this chapter.
The starting point of the analysis is the dismissal of the WWII/partisan films along the
lines of the totalitarian model. Some recent scholarship deems these films the main cinematic
pillars of the regime propaganda, and reduces them to myth-making in the most pejorative sense
of the term: the creating and maintaining of the non-truths about WWII in the Yugoslav
territories. The authors dismissive of the partisan film argue that its differentia specifica – the
ultimate proof of their alleged dogmatic content and propagandistic purpose – resides in the clear
cut divide between the Good and the Evil, as embodied in the partisans and the occupiers,
respectively. However, I argue that the theoretical gender optics reveal that the allegedly blackand-white world of the WWII/partisan films is actually quite colourful. In order to illustrate that,
I showcase several motifs, plots and character types. These examples testify not only to the fact
that the claims about the Manichean world of the WWII films are rather exaggerated and have no
substantial footing in the films themselves, but also that gender was integral to challenging such
a crass black-and-white outlook.
3.1
Partisan films and the anti-leftist odium
Their original socio-political context might be dead and gone for more than two decades now,
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yet the WWII/partisan films continue to cast an ambiguous spell on post-Yugoslavia. It is not
just that they roam the Yugoslav daughter states by means of DVDs, television, and Internet; as
the major cultural signpost of the socialist heritage, but that the partisan film is popping up every
now and then in the post-socialist cultural production, from the high culture to the popular and
mass culture.48 This resilient fascination, however, has its conjoined twin, the opprobrium that
four flashback episodes set in 1914, 1922, 1929, and 1941; in the last segment, the quislings hunt down of a member
of resistance – an elemental plot of many WWII thrillers.
48
Illustrative in this regard is Valter brani Sarajevo/Walter Defends Sarajevo (1972, Hajrudin Krvavac),
arguably the most popular partisan film ever (Šešić, 2006). The post-Yugoslav references to the film abound from
Dubravka Ugrešić’s novel The Ministry of Pain (2006), and Aleksandar Hemon’s story “Imitation of Life” (2000),
to Lazar Stojanović’s Škorpioni: Spomenar/The Scorpions: A Home Movie (2009), the chilling documentary about
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designates partisan films as the celluloid repository of the totalitarian dogmas: “Within Yugoslav
communism, cinema and (especially) the partisan war epics played a role similar to the role of
cathedrals in medieval Christianity”, conveying “the absolute essence of the Titoist spirit”
(Pavičić, 2012, p. 49).
What underlies that odium is the totalitarian paradigm as the major expression of the antiYugoslav and anti-socialist backlash. Integral to this backlash is the all-pervasive revision of the
historical narratives about WWII that were operative in the socialist Yugoslavia. In the postYugoslavia, the partisan antifascist struggle is systematically minimized if not maligned, while
the quislings, who were in socialism repudiated as the “domestic traitors [domaći izdajnici]”, are
patently absolved and elevated into the real heroes and martyrs.49 Serbian historian Olivera
Milosavljević aptly summarizes the issue: “the key question today is not why, back in the period
from 1941 to 1945, some people decided to become quislings, and others to fight fascism. The
key question is: why, in 2005/2006, the former have become the victims, whereas the latter
became the criminals [danas nije ključno pitanje zašto su se 1941–1945. jedni opredelili da budu
kvislinzi a drugi borci protiv fašizma. Ključno pitanje je: zašto su 2005/06. prvi postali žrtve, a
drugi zločinci]” (2006, p. 12).
The most obvious answer lies in the ethnic–national gist of the post-Yugoslav totalitarian
paradigm. Ever fervent guardians of the ethnic imperative, the backlashers loath interethnic
solidarity, the core value of the Yugoslav socialist project, and vilify partisans for betraying the
purity of the national thing. The very same optics pardons the quislings as the defenders of the
national cause: they have sided with the Axis powers in order to protect their – “our own” –
nation in the stormy times. The cut-throat racism and anti-Semitism that were integral to their
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politics are explained away as pragmatic coping with the historical circumstances.
Of course, far from being endemic to post-Yugoslavia, this besmirching of interethnic
and international solidarity is conterminous with the general rise of political right in Europe
the notorious Serbian death squad in the wars of the 1990s, to the hit song “Valter” by Dubioza Kolektiv, one of the
most popular post-Yugoslav bands. The film is also in the focus of Valter/Walter (2012, Andrej Aćin), a
documentary biopic on actor Velimir Bata Živojinović, whose status of the greatest Yugoslav male star was
cemented by the film’s titular role. Even as I finish the thesis, the news pours in about the internationally coproduced remake of the film. The participation of a Chinese film company as the major producer should not be
surprising if we know that the original film was reportedly seen by an audience of 1.3 million in China back in the
1970s (Cult war movie, 2014).
49
For the detailed overviews of the wide range of the revisionist practices throughout post-Yugoslavia, see
Karačić, Banjeglav, and Govedarica (2012), and Markovina (2014).
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nowadays. Symptomatic of this trend, among other things, are the pleas for the equidistance
between Nazism and communism as the two totalitarian systems, which, in the current rightwing dominance, effectively boil down to the demonization of the political left and the snubbing
of the socialist resistance to Nazism and fascism.50 In such an ideological constellation,
Yugoslav partisan films are among the celluloid reminders of the antifascist struggle as the most
important political struggle that constituted modern Europe. Slovenian film critic Marcel
Štefančič (2004) said that partisan films are the major Yugoslav contribution to the European
pop culture; today, more than ever, we have to spell out that this is the case not only due to its
generic features, but also because it celebrates the values and principles that made WWII, to use
the famous American phrase, the Good War. One should not be surprised, then, that partisan film
today is stigmatized by those who identify with the forces defeated in that war.
3.2
Homogenizing the WWII/partisan film
Needless to say, most of the scholars who dismiss the partisan films as such most certainly do
not subscribe to the right-wing revisionism that spearheads the anti-partisan odium. And yet their
accounts chime with it, in a resonance that is both uncanny and, presumably, unwilling. If we
return to the “Art vs. Propaganda” dichotomy as the most convenient device for the totalitarianmodel mapping of Yugoslav cinema, the partisan films stand for the ultimate embodiment of its
latter pole: they are vehicles of “the absolute essence of the Titoist spirit”, which are directed by
a legion of the “party hacks”, whose main, if not sole, intention was to delude the spectators into
the official, dogmatic “truths” about WWII.
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This tunnel-vision perspective involves a strategy that is analogous to the designation of
“the black wave” as the Art pole of the “Artist vs. Regime” dichotomy: a remarkably
heterogeneous set of films gets homogenized along some presupposed ideological trait. We
50
The European Parliament provides one of the paramount examples of such revisionism by designating August
23 as the European day of remembrance of the victims of all totalitarian and authoritarian regimes. In this case, the
date of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact in 1939 does not only serve as the reminder of supposedly innate affinity
between Nazism and Stalinism, but stands as the key trigger of WWII, as if the war had not effectively started
earlier, when Hitler occupied Czechoslovakia, with the approval of France and United Kingdom. In other words,
although the victims of Stalinism most certainly deserve an appropriate commemoration, it is highly problematic to
use the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact for that purpose, as that move conceals the historical importance of the Munich
Agreement, i.e. of the fact that the leaders of the exemplary European democracies had approved Hitler’s conquest
even before Stalin. Apparently, “Quod licet Iovi…” applies here: what is allowed to Neville Chamberlain apparently
is not allowed to Vyacheslav Molotov.
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could argue that the homogenization of the WWII/partisan fodder is even more encompassing
than the blending of the novi film variety into “the black wave” monochrome, for the former
includes a significantly larger number of films produced over a much longer historical period.
From the totalitarian-model vantage, however, the remarkable differences among the
WWII/partisan films pale in comparison to their allegedly uniform and monolithic ideological
outlook. In what can be seen as an exemplary case of “the descendant type of analysis”, the
proponents of the totalitarian paradigm describe these films only by deducing their specificities
from their (alleged) manipulative, propagandist function.
Greg DeCuir offers a text-book example of this approach. In the very same study in
which he homogenized the “black wave” at the expense of the many nuances of novi film, he
defines the partisan genre as “One of the most effective means in which the League of Yugoslav
Communists perpetuated their collective myths and ideologies”, and reduces it to “a national
dream, utilized so that Yugoslav citizens would sleep peacefully knowing that the heritage of
heroes past was protecting them” (2011, p. 28). DeCuir supports these general claims with these
five films only: Na svoji zemlji/On Our Own Land (1948, France Štiglic), Daleko je
sunce/Distant is the Sun (1953, Radoš Novaković), Bitka na Neretvi/The Battle of Neretva (1969,
Veljko Bulajić), Valter brani Sarajevo/Walter Defends Sarajevo (1972, Hajrudin Krvavac), and,
strangely, Život je naš/Life is Ours (1948, Gustav Gavrin), which is not a WWII-set film to begin
with. He does not bother to explain why he cherry-picked these films specifically, but sketches
each of them with a synoptic paragraph at best, and smoothly relegates them to “what can be
called a ‘romantic’ socialist realism; [...] they adhered to the dogma of socialist realism with
regards to content and form” (DeCuir, 2011, p. 28). According to DeCuir, the socialist-realist
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slant of the WWII/partisan films is transhistorical or ahistorical.
Bosnian scholar Senadin Musabegović subscribes to the same vantage in his book-length
study Rat: Konstitucija totalitarnog tijela [War: Constitution of the Totalitarian Body] (2008).
Arguing that a specific image of the “totalitarian body” is one of the fundamental tenets of each
totalitarian regime, Musabegović explores ways in which these imaginary bodies are constituted
in Bolshevik Russia, Fascist Italy, Nazi Germany, and socialist Yugoslavia. In “Totalitarizam i
jugoslavensko socijalističko iskustvo [Totalitarianism and the Yugoslav socialist experience]”,
the second part of the study, he foregrounds the partisan films as the principal instrument for the
creation and dissemination of the Yugoslav totalitarian body. First, he asserts that the partisan–
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totalitarian body was decisively moulded by the aesthetics of socialist realism, and then, in a
glaring non sequitur, equates the WWII/partisan film as such with socialist realism.
The thesis about the everlasting socialist-realist kernel of the partisan films defies the
elementary facts about the Yugoslav cinema history, which I mentioned in the Introduction: not
only did the socialist realism vanish from Yugoslav cinema by the mid-1950s, only to be traced
residually since then, but the partisan films simultaneously lost the status of the most numerous
group of films in Yugoslav cinema. Each of the authors conceals these facts for their own
reasons. DeCuir does it in order to extol the “black wave”: “The Partisan war film solidified and
forwarded a dogmatic national ideology and a collective myth, in doing so becoming the basis
for an oppositional cinema to depart from” (2011, p. 35). For Musabegović, silence on the
relatively short expiry date of socialist realism in Yugoslav cinema is the very bedrock of his
study. If he had admitted that socialist realism did not last long in Yugoslav cinema, his central
premise on the longevity of the Titoist “totalitarian body”, as moulded by socialist realism,
would disappear in thin air.
Arguably the most bizarre illustration of this strategy is the way in which the totalitarianmodel vantage deals with the WWII-set action films and epics characteristic of the late 1960s
and early 1970s. Although these films, often mockingly labelled as the “red wave”, were made
some twenty years after socialist realism lost its hegemonic position in Yugoslav cinema, authors
like DeCuir and Musabegović – or, for that matter, Jurica Pavičić (2003) and Aida Vidan (2011)
– deem them as nothing more than socialist-realist spawn. Musabegović’s central showcase is
Sutjeska/The Battle of Sutjeska (1973, Stipe Delić), a war epic that starred Richard Burton and
Irene Papas, made in the time when one could not find socialist realism even in Kremlin.
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DeCuir sees The Battle of Neretva and Walter Defends Sarajevo as “fine examples of the
dominant output of the Yugoslav film industry from the post-war period through the 50s until the
60s and the advent of Yugoslav New Film” (2011, p. 35) – a puzzling statement given that they
were made as late as 1968 and 1972, respectively. He also asserts that The Battle of Neretva
“transformed the Partisan war film, ironically enough, into a commodity spectacle” (DeCuir,
2011, p. 33, emphasis mine). And yet, this irony exists only in the eye of the beholder who seems
unable to realize that the commodity-spectacle effect was anything but a side effect. The film’s
lavish budget and the stellar cast – Sergei Bondarchuk, Yul Brynner, Franco Nero, and Orson
Welles, to name a few – were a means to glamorize WWII, testifying that the commodity
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spectacle is exactly what many a partisan films in the late 1960s and early 1970s was primarily
about. With claims like these, totalitarian-model narratives obfuscates even relatively wellknown facts about the “red wave”; most notably, that these films emulated the war films from
Hollywood and British cinema, just as westerns and action films. For example, whereas DeCuir
and Musabegović relegate the partisan action films directed by Hajrudin Krvavac to socialist
realism, Yugoslav film critics were deemed them as the Yugoslav westerns, a genre fashioned by
Žika Mitrović in the mid-1950s. According to Štefančič, “Krvavac’s Partisan films of the 1960s
have to be granted their legacy of the Western, remaining, alongside the spaghetti Western and
Packinpah school, the last shield protecting the vitality of the Western in general [Krvavčevim
partizanaricam moramo priznati, da so v šestdesetih vzele nase dediščino vesterna ter da so ob
špageti vesternih in Packinpahovi šoli ostali zadnji oklop vitalnega vesterna sploh]” (2004, p.
298). Although this appraisal might seem a bit overenthusiastic, I find Štefančič’s thesis
irrefutable. To silently ignore the fact that ‘Red Wave’ films owe more to The Guns of Navarone
(1961, J. Lee Thompson), and Battle of Britain (1969, Guy Hamilton) than to The Fall of Berlin
(1950, Mikhail Chiaureli) is a patent misrepresentation of the history of Yugoslav cinema.51
3.3
The “great divide” fallacy
On what grounds, then, do these authors claim that the WWII/partisan films are an apparently
everlasting socialist-realist affair? What piece of evidence about the propagandist and dogmatic
nature and the socialist-realist slant of these films do they hold? Here is Musabegović’s answer:
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It is a typical characteristic of the partisan socialist realist films to represent a black and white
differentiation of the characters into “our” combatants and those coming from the outside, the
occupiers. Their socialist realist poetics neither explains the motifs, nor enters the psychology of
the characters, especially those of the occupier, nor does it create a deeper analysis of the
situations and the times in which fascism emerges. The vantage point from which the spectator is
supposed to observe an event is strictly the partisan’s perspective, as the spectator is supposed to
identify with his heroic gestures that exclude, quite radically, the enemy.
Stoga je tipska karakteristika partizanskih socrealističkih filmova da predstave crno–bijelu
diferencijaciju likova na “naše” borce i na one što dolaze izvana, koji su okupatori. Njihova
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Musabegović’s censorship of the basic historical facts is of a broad sweep, to say the least. In a manoeuvre
scandalous by any academic standard, he does not offer a single bibliographic reference on Yugoslav cinema.
DeCuir’s account of the partisan films also suffers from the lack of references. He quotes only Daniel J. Goulding on
the socialist-realist slant of the early Yugoslav cinema, and even conveniently ignores the fact that Goulding also
described the vanishing of the socialist realism as integral to “breaking the mould” in the 1950s.
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socrealistička poetika ne objašnjava motive, niti ulazi u psihologiju likova, pogotovu onih koji
pripadaju okupatoru, niti stvara dublju analizu situacija i vremena u kojima se pojavljuje fašizam.
Tačka gledišta iz koje gledalac treba da posmatra dogadjaj je isključivo perspektiva partizana,
prije svega zato što se gledalac treba identificirati sa njihovim junačkim gestama koji iskljuluju,
na radikalan način, neprijatelja.
(Musabegović, 2008, p. 222)
This is hardly an exceptional stance. DeCuir shares the gist of this argument: he also mentions
“simplified good/evil dichotomies and conflicts” as the only proper socialist-realist traits (2011,
p. 28), and, for example, criticizes a 1953 partisan film as “not a wholly-subversive of classical
Yugoslav cinematographic values: the basic conflict of the film is still one of good versus evil,
represented by Partisans versus Germans” (2011, p. 33).
The first reproach to this argument about the good versus evil dichotomy draws upon the
history of philosophy and literature. As Fredric Jameson summed it up, “the ethical binary
opposition of good and evil [is] one of the fundamental forms of ideological thought in Western
culture” (2002, p. 73); consequently, it is dispersed in a myriad of genres, and hardly qualifies to
be deemed differentia specifica of any particular. More specifically, the history of WWII informs
the second reproach: representation of WWII as the clash of Good versus Evil was anything but
specific of Yugoslav or socialist-realist cinema, but fell squarely in the history written by the
Allies. Consider Hollywood, for example:
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almost without fail, at least until the late 1960s, Hollywood’s World War II films served the
purpose of affirming the national perception that World War II was the Good War. Despite
complexities of character and sometimes plot, the clear message was that during those
extraordinary wartime years, Americans rose above their personal flaws, overcame their doubts
and Great Depression-era cynicism, to fight the good fight, suffer the necessary sacrifices, and
defeat the threat of evil from the Axis powers.
(McCrisken & Pepper, 2005, p. 93)
Hence, it would be more than interesting to learn how many of the Hollywood WWII-set films
from the late 1940s or early 1950s would fit DeCuir’s standard of being wholly subversive by
not screening the Nazis as the bad guys. However, by neglecting the post-war global ideological
constellation and its repercussions for cinema in the US and throughout Europe, DeCuir and
Musabegović fail to admit that the Good versus Evil dichotomy is not the defining trait of the
early Yugoslav socialist-realist cinema, let alone the WWII/partisan films.
A notable evidence of this, with regard to the Yugoslav WWII/partisan films, comes from
a filmmaker who could hardly be described as proponent of the socialist-realism: Orson Welles.
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After he played a četnik leader in The Battle of Neretva, he was offered a role of Winston
Churchill in The Battle of Sutjeska. Welles declined the offer, yet agreed to comment on the early
draft of the script. He grouped the shortcomings of the scenario into two groups: the westernstyle ones and the socialist-realist ones. Given this particular division, his following remarks are
rather illuminating:
I think the attempt to make the German forces appear humane [in the film] would be a weak and
feeble take on The Battle on Neretva. This is why the Nazi forces have to be, for the partisans
(and for the viewer alike), faceless, a grey wall of metal and a red wall of fire. [...] The only
encounter, the only moment when we get a glimpse of a human being in this sheet of “metal”, is
during the chest-to-chest battle, in the “embrace” in which both [the Partisan and the Nazi soldier]
roll down the muddy slope and die.
Mislim da bi pokušaj humaniziranja njemačke snage bio slabi i blijed pokušaj Bitke na Neretvi.
Zato nacističke snage moraju za partizane (i za gledaoca) da budu bezlični, sivi zid metala i
crveni zid vatre. [...] Jedini susret, jedini moment kad u “metalu” naziremo ljudsko stvorenje jeste
za vrijeme borbe prsa u prsa, za vrijeme “zagrljaja” u kome se jedni i drugi kotrljaju i umiru niz
blatnu padinu.
(Husić, 1973, pp. 63–64)
A proponent of the totalitarian model unaware who wrote the quoted lines might easily attribute
them to some overzealous Yugoslav Zhdanovite: does not such a sweeping reduction of Nazi
soldiers to the elements – the ultimate widening of the “us vs. them”, i.e. of the “good vs. evil”
divide – amount to the ultimate proof of a “totalitarian consciousness”? However, Welles’
suggestion implies differently: the radical dehumanization of the enemy is not specific for
socialist realism as such. Hence, the presence of the “good vs. evil” polarity in any film – let
alone in a WWII/partisan film – does not suffice to be described as the socialist realist one.
Although these two previous points are important, the most salient evidence that
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contradicts the “great divide” thesis comes from the films themselves. The clear-cut pattern
between the good guys (“us”) and villains (“them”) was certainly at play in the WWII/partisan
films of the early classic Yugoslav cinema, but even back then the film critics and the
filmmakers promptly recognized it as obvious shortcoming and criticized it quite harshly. For
example, the fact that Major Bauk (1951, Nikola Popović) was eagerly awaited as the first
feature film produced in the republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, did not save it from being
critically lambasted precisely for the lack of nuance in the designation of both protagonists and
antagonists. Here is an exemplary review from the daily Politika:
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How many more times will a German, a četnik, a saboteur and other “villains” in our scenarios
stand as the pure extracts of snake evil, and the mothers, the combatants and the commissars fly
high up in a trance of sublime heroism – as in the Branko Ćopić’s scenario for Major Bauk? […]
the black ones are all equally black, and the whites are all the same. Do [the villains] Gajo and
Vranić differ in any way – other than by the length of their moustaches?
Pa koliko će još puta Nemac, četnik, saboter i drugi “negativci” u našim scenarijima biti čisti
ekstrakti zmijske zloće, a majke, borci i komesari uzletati u nebo u transu sublimiranog herojstva
– kao u scenariju Branka Ćopića za film Major Bauk? […] crni su svi podjednako crni, a i beli su
isti među sobom. Da li se Gajo i Vranić ičim razlikuju – sem dužinom brkova?!
(Filmska hronika: “Major Bauk”, 1951)
What is most important is that this criticism did not fall on deaf ears. From the mid-1950s on, not
all Partisans’ adversaries were equally black, just as not all Partisans were untainted white. The
game-changer in this regard was Daleko je sunce/Distant is the Sun (1953, Radoš Novaković),
the eleventh WWII-set film, which broke the monolith image of the partisans to a significant
appraisal of the film critics. In order to fully describe the film’s key novelty, let me recount it in
more detail. The combat between the partisans and the Nazis is only the backdrop for the film’s
central conflict: the discord between the two leaders of a partisan unit. Whilst the military
commander lieutenant Uča argues that the unit should stay together and continue to fight in its
home region, the Party commissar Pavle insists that it should be split into two smaller units,
which would leave the region altogether. When the two start mutually accusing each other of
ambitiousness and dishonesty, the rest of the unit is aghast. One of the partisans explicitly warns
them: “Your personal disputes will tear the unit apart! [Vaše lične svadje će da razbiju
jedinicu!]” The turmoil culminates when the third member of the unit’s headquarter, Uča’s
deputy Gvozden, utterly dismisses the possibility of leaving the home turf and suggests that the
unit dissolves altogether. Appalled by Gvozden’s suggestion, Pavle and Uča demote him and
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accuse him of cowardice in front of the whole unit. In one of the most charged scenes of the
classical Yugoslav cinema, Gvozden opposes to the two, presents his case, and invites some
partisans to leave with him back to their villages. Triggered by such a direct act of disobedience
and by the danger of the dissipation of the unit, Pavle summons the Vojni sud, the five soldiers
(Uča being one of them) sentence Gvozden to death, and one of the fellow combatants executes
the punishment by shooting.52
52
Daniel J. Goulding inaccurately sums up the plot: “A brave peasant fighter from the region, Gvozden, leads an
attack not sanctioned by the staff of the Partisan unit. In the interest of discipline, he is judged and executed by his
own comrades” (2002, p. 48). That way, Goulding conceals both the proper traumatic dimension and novelty of the
film’s designation of the partisan movement.
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Although Pavle blatantly besmirches Gvozden as a coward, the film itself does not vilify
the latter, but designates him as a tragic hero in his own right. Unlike Pavle and Uča, he is
untainted by any ambition; what motivates his call for dissolution of the unit is nothing but
genuine care for his neighbours. When he realizes that the Nazis killed the local peasants,
punishing them for helping the partisans, Gvozden defiantly yells: “I do not want to fight for a
waste land! [Ja neću da ratujem za pustu zemlju!]” Above all, he does not stop identifying
himself as a communist: he accepts the sentence as the outcome of the party discipline and even
hurries the execution, aware that the Nazis are approaching and that the unit should keep on
moving. Pavle will continue to wrestle with his conscience in the second half of the film, and in
the last dialogue in the film he finds out that he will be “called out [pozvan na odgovornost]” for
the execution of Gvozden.
In his review, the influential critic Milutin Čolić lauded Distant is the Sun as the veritable
break in the representation of the partisan movement. He described the previous partisan films as
effectively the same socialist realist film: despite the variety of their plots and characters, they all
shared “a single psychological level, without any antagonistic inner conditions, personal
dilemmas or crises. There was neither a conflict between the persons, nor within them [jedne su
psihološke ravni, bez oprečnih unutarnjih stanja, ličnih dilemma ili kriza. Nema sukoba ni medju
ljudima, niti u njima samima]”; Distant is the Sun, however, was innovative “not much in the
way of an artistic achievement, but as, we would say, an exceptionally important commitment:
an attempt to provide us with a more complete insight into the People’s Liberation Struggle, in
its multi-layers and antagonisms, somewhat darker gamut as opposed to the bright one [ne toliko
umetničkim efektom koliko jednim, rekli bismo, pokušajem da se NOB sagleda celovitije, u
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njenoj slojevitosti i protivrečnostima, ponešto tamnijoj, ne samo svetlijoj gami]” (Čolić, 1984, p.
349). And yez, not even such a substantial step in screening the antagonisms within the partisan
resistance can appease the scholars who are intent to reduce the partisan films to the socialistrealist propaganda. Distant is the Sun is the very film which DeCuir sees as “not whollysubversive” of the classic Yugoslav cinema; Musabegović does not mention it at all.
In opposition to such a blatant neglect, Distant is the Sun indeed might appear to be the
point of no return in the cinematic designation of WWII and the socialist revolution beyond the
black-and-white divide. However, I would slightly correct this picture by proposing that, instead
of a single film, we take 1953 as the watershed moment in the WWII representation on screen.
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Ironically, out of the nine films made that year, only two were set in WWII – the other one being
Gustav Gavrin’s Bila sam jača/I was Stronger – however, both portrayed their characters with
significant shades of grey. In their classifications of the WWII/partisan films, Yugoslav critics
described this shift as the one from “naive romanticism [naivni romantizam]” (Munitić, 1974, pp.
15–24), or the “heroic romanticism” (Čolić, 1984, pp. 170–180), which was specific for the early
classic cinema, to “de-romanticization [deromantizacija]” of the WWII/partisan films from
approximately the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s. Referring to Distant is the Sun again, Čolić
describes de-romanticization in terms of remodelling of
the individual hero of the revolution. [With Gvozden], the typology of the characters begins to
change: they are less the theses and the symbols, monoliths made of the unhesitant and the
untouchable. The first warrior brings doubt and resistance, the possibility of suspicion and
opposition to the ruling norms. In a word, the first man in the war film.
individualnog heroja revolucije. [Sa Gvozdenom] počinje da se menja tipologija likova: sve su
manje teze i simboli, monoliti od materije nepokolebljivosti i neprikosnovenosti. Prvi ratnik koji
donosi sumnju i otpor, mogućnost podozrenja i pononecije važećim pravilima. Jednom reči, prvi
čovek integralno u ratnom filmu.
(Čolić, 1984, p. 184).
Although I subscribe to this thesis in general, I argue that the gender-focused exploration of
WWII/partisan film can help us to discern even more shades instead of the black-and-white
dichotomy. Noticing that Čolić’s account of de-romanticization is heavily centred on the male
partisan hero, such an analysis would pose a question on other protagonists that were integral to
the early classic partisan films, most prominently the female ones, but also the antagonists (the
occupiers and the quislings). In the following pages, I will gloss several themes and motifs,
which reveal that gender was integral to the de-romanticization. However, before doing that, I
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will do a sort of gender mapping of the early classic WWII/partisan films in order to check the
ways in which the socialist-realist aesthetics moulded the gender representations.
3.4.
The partisan romance in the time of the revolutionary asceticism
Let us approach the early WWII/partisan by foregrounding its main romantic ingredient: a
specific type of love relationship between a man and a woman who are both committed to the
antifascist struggle and the socialist revolution. Their relationship, by rule, features a tragic
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ending in which one or both of them die while fighting the occupiers. Milan Ranković had in
mind this type of romance when he stressed the overall prudishness of the early Yugoslav films:
The first post-war period is dominated by films that subdue the relationship between the sexes to
an idealized melodrama, which mostly left out references to any sort of physical aspect of that
relationship. Our first films on revolution are characterized by asexual love. In that period, in
which war heroism was replaced by work hedonism, many sorts of depravation were used to test
the moral strength of the persons who opted for socialism […] The cruel morality of the sexual
asceticism, imposed by the necessities of the war, transferred to the morality of the first post-war
years. It possessed some of the religious exclusiveness and often led to sexuality being identified
with immorality.
U prvom posleratnom periodu dominiraju filmovi u kojima je prikazivanje odnosa medju
polovima svedeno na idealizovanu melodramu, u okviru koje je uglavnom izostajalo ukazivanje
na bilo koju telesnu komponentu tog odnosa. Naše prve filmove o revoluciji karakteriše
aseksualna ljubav. U tome periodu, u kome je ratni heroizam bio zamenjen radnim hedonizmom,
mnoge vrste lišavanja bile su merila provere moralne čvrstine za socijalizam opredeljene ličnosti.
[...] Surovi moral seksualne askeze, nametnut ratnom nužnošću, preneo se i na moral prvih
poratnih godina. On je imao nešto od religijske isključivosti i neretko je dovodio do olake
identifikacije seksualnosti s nemoralom.
(Ranković, 1979, p. 254)
However, instead of taking the “revolutionary asceticism” at face value, I propose that we should
see it as an exemplary social dictum that, by stipulating eroticism, we actually entice it:
An obstacle is required in order to heighten libido; and where natural resistances to satisfaction
have not been sufficient men have at all times erected conventional ones so as to be able to enjoy
love. This is true both of individuals and of nations. [...] In this connection it may be claimed that
the ascetic current in Christianity created psychical values for love which pagan antiquity was
never able to confer on it. This current assumed its greatest importance with the ascetic monks,
whose lives were almost entirely occupied with the struggle against libidinal temptation.
(Freud, 2001, pp. 186–187)
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We should not overlook that the revolutionary asceticism did not shape all types of films in the
same way. As we shall see in the following chapters, romance and eroticism were by large
treated differently in the WWII/partisan films, the socialism-set films, and those set in the
previous historical epochs. For the time being, it will suffice to say that, in their most general,
sexuality and eroticism were more at display in the historical films, whereas they were more
repressed in the WWII-set and socialism-set films, although, with significantly different closures
(a tragic endings being reserved for the former, and the happy endings for the latter). However, a
closer look reveals that even the WWII/partisan films, which were supposedly under the strictest
political control, juggled several strategies of representation of romance and sexuality.
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3.4.1. Slavica
The prototype of the revolutionary romance is found in Slavica (1947), a film that designates the
partisan antifascist movement as the direct continuation of the pre-war proletarian resistance. Let
me take a cue from Daniel J. Goulding’s portrait of the titular protagonist and her romantic
relationship with the fisherman-turned-partisan Marin: “Slavica is a courageous young maiden in
love with Marin but too constrained by the rigors of battle to express more than an occasional
comradely embrace. [...] The brave Slavica loses her life to German bullets while she is in the
hold of the ship trying to caulk the holes made by German shells. [...] The ship is named Slavica
in her honor” (2002, p. 17). However, this synopsis is astonishingly inaccurate to the extent that
one has to ask oneself: did Goulding actually see the film? The ship was not baptized after
Slavica, in honour of her sacrificial death, but before the war, while she was helping the cooperative of the local fishermen to build it, in an act of resistance against the local capitalist who
had the monopoly in fishing. Also, even more importantly, by the time Slavica joins partisans
she is not a maiden, but a wife. She and Marin marry in a ceremony that crowns the efforts of the
fishermen’s co-operative. As one of the fishermen quips, it is Slavica’s double wedding: as the
ship marries the sea (i.e. gets launched), Slavica marries Marin. And yet, as the newly married
couple basks in the glow, the first Nazi airplanes fly over the wedding on their way to drop the
first bombs on the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. In one of the most impressive details in the film, the
image of the newly-weds morphs into an image of the couple departing as Marin leaves to fight
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the war (FIGURE 3.1–4).
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FIGURE 3.1–4 Marital bliss vanishes in a single shot in Slavica (1947)
Slavica, thus, does not incarnate the revolutionary asceticism. A far cry from the proverbial
virginal purity, which has to be sacrificed at the altar of Revolution, she is actually a prime
mover of the action, most notably in the first part of the film, which is set in the pre-war period
and centred on the building of Slavica. Working in a local fish factory, with her old poor parents,
she witnesses the crass capitalist exploitation first hand, and, accordingly, advocates for social
change through the workers’ solidarity. Although Marin is equally aware of the capitalist
exploitation, he is, nevertheless, reluctant to join the fishermen’s co-operative. It is only after he
meets Slavica and hears her emotive talk about solidarity that he joins the building of the boat,
i.e. the revolutionary project. In other words, Marin’s romantic attachment to Slavica paves the
way to his ideological attachment; her revolutionary commitment is a necessary precondition to
his own. Slavica’s love for Marin is not limited to the “occasional comradely embraces”: when
she and Marin kiss for the first time, it is Slavica who initiates the pucker and suggests that the
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two of them should get together.
The film also unmistakably registers the double repression of women in the pre-war
gender order: Slavica does not only suffer repression in the factory, but in her home as well,
where she has to resist the backward worldview of her parents. Members of the slaving class, her
parents, nevertheless, consider the existing order unchangeable and chastise Slavica for opposing
it. One should not forget that even such an order gives the parents – especially Slavica’s father –
the power over their daughter: hence, they dream of marrying her off to the factory owner, and
even when Slavica marries Marin, they still resent her for marrying him instead of marrying a
wealthy man. However, as Slavica resists the class exploitation, she also defies her parents in
what turns out to be an everlasting education, uprooting them from the norms and values specific
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of the ancient regime. The father seems to be a more apt pupil, as he acknowledges the
revolutionary change more gradually and swiftly then the mother. She, however, will have
learned her final lesson with her daughter’s death. In the film’s finale, when Marin informs his
parents-in-law about Slavica’s death, the camera zeroes in on the mother’s face: only now, after
finding out about her daughter’s death, that she realizes how profound and worthy that change
must be when her daughter gave her life for it (FIGURE 3.5–6).
FIGURE 3.5–6 The mother’s ultimate lesson in Slavica (1947)
Much more than a partisan combat film, Slavica is about introducing the new values and ways of
the socialist order to the old, traditional underclass and non-educated family – particularly those
relating to the shift between the two: the traditional and the socialist gender order. The shift
between the two is perfectly captured in the move from the scene in which Slavica sees Marin
off as a soldier of the royalist Yugoslav army in June 1941, to the scene when – once they
become partisans – it is him who sees her off to Dalmatia, his birthplace, to join the partisan
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units in Bosnia.
3.4.2. On Our Own Land and Immortal Youth
In the early Yugoslav films, only one more title renders the romance between the active,
ideologically aware woman, and the man who is at first reluctant toward the revolutionary cause,
but eventually succumbs to it guided by his love for her. In Na svoji zemlji/On Our Own Land
(1948, France Štiglic), Drejc and Tildica are the only love couple in the wide ensemble of
protagonists. Utterly committed to the antifascist and revolutionary struggle, Tildica joins the
partisans early, whereas Drejc’s commanding mother does not allow him to leave the home and
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join the resistance. The conflict between Drejc and the mother is emphasized by the fact that he
is not a boy, but a man in his mid-thirties, who, nevertheless, does not dare to question the
matriarch’s command.53 Despising his own cowardice, Drejc calls himself a deserter, and
effectively sides with the members of the national home guard [domobrani], who station
themselves in his (or better: his mother’s) household. When the domobrani catch Tildica and
imprison her in Drejc’s house (“She is not a woman, she is a partisan!”), Drejc finally decides to
do the right thing: he steals the machine gun and kills the domobrans, sets Tildica free and joins
the partisans. After some time, Tildica tells him that she is pregnant, implying that he is the
father. It is not only a tacit acknowledgment of the love between Tildica and Drejc, but of sexual
life among the partisans in general.
A telling negotiation about the limits of representation of romance is also depicted in
Besmrtna mladost/Immortal Youth (1948, Vojislav Nanović), the first Yugoslav film that
rendered the communist resistance in a large urban centre that is reigned by the quisling regime
(Belgrade, in this particular case). The main protagonists are Rade, one of the most prominent
members of the communist youth in Belgrade, and Vera, the upper class girl who joins the
resistance. The film renders them as equals, both in terms of romantic and ideological
attachment: Vera does not catalyze Rade’s ideological transformation as Slavica and Tildica did,
but neither does Rade introduce Vera to the communist cause. At first, he is patronizing and
afraid that she is not up to the struggle; however, Vera does not care about his opinion and acts
assertively on her own. The film spends some time in acknowledging her detachment from the
rest of her bourgeois family: the father, a wealthy merchant, who wants to keep his family name
untarnished, the vain mother, who believes that Vera should organize soirees, and her brother,
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who belongs to the nationalist youth, refuses the prospects of resistance, and socializes with the
Gestapo officer who lives in their luxurious house. When the German expresses his love to Vera,
he also warns her that he has evidence that she is a member of the resistance. Vera instantly
leaves the parent house, in a clear demonstration of her independence and revolutionary
commitment. Before she gets to her grandmother’s place, however, she stops at Rade’s and his
mother’s flat and spends a night there: although nothing happens between the two, the scene
paves the way for their romance. Two more scenes are illustrative in that regard. First, two of
53
The film does not vilify the mother figure as such, as it renders other good mothers who are more ideologically
aware and support their partisan sons and husbands.
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them enjoy some time together walking around the Kalemegdan fortress; although Rade
expresses his love by saying that under Vera’s gaze he feels as if he is enveloped by thousands
clouds, the scene stops short of screening a kiss or an embrace. In their last appearance on
screen, however, Rade tells Vera that he is about to leave the city and join the partisans in the
countryside; aware that they might not see each other soon or maybe ever again, they kiss and
Rade gently reaches for Vera’s breast, holding it over her clothes for a moment; the girl leaves.
Eventually, Rade gets killed in action, and Vera, herself wounded, receives the sad news about
his death. At first she cries disconsolately, but her and Rade’s colleague persuades her – in
arguably the most didactic speech ever delivered in early Yugoslav cinema – that Rade’s death
has its place and purpose in the revolutionary struggle.
3.4.3. This People Shall Live
Živjeće ovaj narod/This People Shall Live (1947, Nikola Popović), a film about the anti-fascist
uprising in the villages of Bosnian Krajina, follows Jagoda, an adolescent peasant girl, who
wholeheartedly supports the partisan struggle, and who falls in love with Ivan, a partisan miner
famous for blowing up the railroads. Jagoda is similar to Slavica in at least two important
respects: she is a lively, extrovert person, and she eventually dies, leaving her lover to avenge
her. However, her death is rendered significantly different than Slavica’s. Not only is Slavica’s
death incidental, but it is also designated in a more poetic way: when Slavica gets mortally
wounded in the deck, all by herself and unnoticed by the others, the camera zooms on her hands
and the stream of water erupting through the hole in the deck. Pathetic as that scene might appear
to us today, it is, nevertheless, consistent in terms of the overall metonymical relation between
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Slavica and Slavica, the woman and the boat; also, it plays upon the standard relation of
femininity and the “water element” (FIGURE 3.7–10). In that sense, there is nothing inherently
socialist realist about the scene: only the later scenes with Slavica’s mother will retrospectively
transform it into an element of the socialist-realist puzzle.
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FIGURE 3.7–10 The death of Slavica
FIGURE 3.11–12 The death of Jagoda in This People Shall Live (1948)
Jagoda’s death, however, is framed rather differently: the Nazis hang her in a scene that
unmistakably emulates the end of the titular heroine of Zoya, the famous 1944 Soviet war film
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by Lev Arnshtam.54 When the Nazis and četnik forces catch Jagoda, she bravely refuses to
disclose the location of the partisan ambulance and defiantly opposes the German officer who,
enraged by her boldness, orders the execution on the spot; as the henchmen put the rope around
her neck, she fiercely shouts that the partisans prevail (FIGURE 3.11–12). This public spectacle of
both Jagoda’s revolutionary commitment and the Nazis mercilessness is far more didactic in a
proper socialist-realist way than Slavica’s death scene.
Other differences between the two female protagonists, and their respective love
relations, are also important. Equal with Marin in every major respect, Slavica catalyzed his
ideological change through their love; Jagoda, however, is effectively inferior to Ivan in terms of
knowledge and the revolutionary experience, and it is him who catalyzes her transformation for
the better. True, Jagoda wholeheartedly supported the partisan cause even before meeting Ivan,
but it is only after she falls in love with him that she undergoes the revolutionary change proper.
Not only does Ivan tell her, for example, who is Josip Broz Tito, of whom the peasant girl was
absolutely ignorant, but he also triggers her awareness of the shortcomings caused by the
traditional patriarchal upbringing: when he gives Jagoda a news paper article, she admits her
illiteracy and later learns to read.
However, in one substantial aspect Jagoda compensates for this apparent and temporary
inferiority of hers. As she approaches Ivan – and to be sure, she is the one who makes moves on
him, and not vice versa – she crosses the ethnic lines. Jagoda is a Serb, whereas Ivan is a Croat –
hardly a standard combination given the animosity between the two ethnicities, which was
ignited and maintained by their nationalist political elites in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, only to
culminate in the WWII bloodshed. Consequently, Ivan’s presence in the region mostly populated
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with the Serbs, arouses suspicion among those who equate “a Croat” with “an ustaša”, the
member of the notorious quisling regime of Independent State of Croatia, which carried out an
unprecedented genocide against the Serbs. That way, This People Shall Live was the first
Yugoslav film that tackled, at least obliquely, the ethnic hatred as one of the most pressing
problems that could have been resolved only by the communists’ adherence to interethnic
solidarity as one of their fundamental principles. Hence, one is tempted to discard this aspect of
the love affair between Jagoda and Ivan as a crass example of the propaganda: does not their
54
On the representations of women in the Soviet war films, see Youngblood (2010).
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romance merely channel the doctrine of “brotherhood and unity”, as the communists labelled
their interethnic politics?
And yet, if we are to analyze this particular romance, we would do better to drop the
propaganda platitudes, and turn to the literature of Branko Ćopić. One of the most popular
Yugoslav writers, he did not only write the scenario for This People Shall Live, but also a whole
batch of novels and stories about the uprising in Bosanska Krajina, his native region in the West
Bosnia. The analysis of this scope cannot do much more but scratch the surface of Ćopić’s
voluminous opus, but it must be noticed, at least in shorthand, that the interethnic romance is a
specific staple of Ćopić’s writing. Exemplary in that regard are his most ambitious WWII novels
Prolom [The Break-Out, 1952], and Gluvi barut [The Silent Gunpowder, 1957], both set in the
same milieu as This People Shall Live, only far more complex, sprawling, and sombre.55 In both
books, the Serb peasant women are more assertive than their men when it comes to endogamous
romances. Whereas the peasant men prefer to remain within the horizon of their own ethnic
group, and even perpetrate the genocide against “the ethnic others”, the peasant women are more
open to the strangers and outsiders, both coming from the other regions or belonging to other
ethnic group. Due to that openness, they are proto-modern and have more revolutionary potential
than the peasant men, as it were. However, Ćopić does not link that revolutionary potential to
some alleged feminine essence or substance, but traces its materialist roots: it is the peasant
woman’s status of the repressed and exploited “other” in the patriarchal tradition that makes her
attentive to all sorts of repression and exclusion, and dismissive of the chauvinism and
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provincialism.
55
Ćopić was criticized as the heretic writer who subverts the Yugoslav social reality as early as 1950, and The
Silent Gunpowder was arguably his most controversial work, due to its unfavourable descriptions of some partisan
protagonists and their misdeeds.
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FIGURE 3.13–14 The female ensembles and masses in This People Shall Live
FIGURE 3.15–16 Ritual unraveling of the women’s hair in This People Shall Live
Ćopić’s view of the peasant women as the genuine proto-revolutionary force enables the film to
designate and celebrate another type of women’s participation in war. Unlike Slavica, Jagoda
and other peasant women never reach for a gun, i.e. they never become partisans; yet they
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substantially support the partisan movement by means of massive and demanding actions. For
example, Jagoda organizes and conducts a march of three hundred women carrying grains
through the snowy mountain to a partisan-held city plagued by hunger (FIGURE 3.13). Generally,
the presence of women dominates most of the scenes that depict the village life and the uprising
of the peasant masses (FIGURE 3.14). In many scenes, the ensembles of the peasant women serve
as a chorus that comments the unfolding events by singing the traditional and the partisan songs:
they mourn the losses and celebrate the victories. In arguably the most delicate scene that
combines the traditional experience of the rural women and the revolutionary experience of the
antifascist struggle, the women unravel their long braids – the traditional hairstyle in the
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countryside – in order to magically help the partisans: just as the women unravel their long hair,
so should the partisan’s paths unravel safety from every menace (FIGURE 3.15–16). Hence, while
Slavica was a paean to the partisan woman, This People Shall Live celebrated contribution of the
women that nominally might not have been partisans, but whose work was of cardinal
importance for the partisan guerrilla war, in which “the front” and “the home front” intricately
combined.
3.4.4. The Flag
The final example in this subchapter is Zastava/The Flag (1949, Branko Marjanović), the film
about Marija, a ballerina who leaves Zagreb and joins the partisans. The film is bookended with
scenes set in the post-war present, with Marija talking to her younger colleagues about quitting
her job in the national ballet troupe during the war and leaving for the woods. The most of the
film is effectively in flashbacks, although not structured around Marija’s perspective or presence
(she is neither the narrator nor the focalizer in the strict sense). Unlike the other female
protagonists mentioned here, she is not acutely aware of the ideological content of the antifascist
struggle or the revolutionary cause. What drives Marija to join the partisans is not a the clear
prospect of taking part in the revolution, but primarily her decision to run away from the
atmosphere of terror in Zagreb, the capital of the ustaša puppet regime, which sucks her dry of
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élan vital and desire to dance.
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FIGURE 3.17–20 Marija breaks down under Vuksan’s piercing gaze in The Flag
The rule of ustaša is incarnated in the officer Vuksan, a brute who sleazily makes advances at
Marija. Profoundly disgusted by his obnoxious persona, Marija nearly collapses on stage under
Vuksan’s piercing gaze from the balcony (FIGURE 3.17–20). Only after Marija arrives among the
partisans, she starts gradually understanding the virtuous nature of the communist revolution and
the national liberation. Again, the sentimental education buttresses the ideological one: Marija
falls in love with the partisan commander Petar, who will lead the unit to a triumphant victory in
the last part of the film. Once we return into the socialist present, Marija reveals that Petar did
not live to see the liberation and peace. In the film’s finale, she dances out her own experience of
revolution, in a glorious allegorical memento to Petar and all of those who sacrificed their lives
for the liberation and the revolution. Of all the revolutionary romances in the early films
described here, this one is the most restrained and covert one: Petar might be attracted to Marija
romantically, but he effectively acts only as a mentor, speaking of the revolutionary efforts and
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invincibility of the people; Marija, on her part, fails to infuse any sort of romantic discourse in
their rapport. She admits that she cannot express herself in words, and promises Petar that some
time in the future she will express all of her unspeakable feelings through dance.
3.5.
Vindicating the glamour
After glossing over these representations of the revolutionary love, let us now refocus on its
opposite: the coupling of sexuality and eroticism on the one hand, with the anti-socialist ideology
and politics on the other. Whereas the revolutionary project was linked to the subdued
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representations of sexuality, the accentuated, untamed and flaunting sexuality was connected to
the ancient regime, bourgeoisie and Nazism. That this nexus of the menacing ideology and
menacing sexuality was most spectacularly incarnated in the images of the bad women should
not surprise us, after a substantial body of feminist scholarship analyzed that representational
strategy in many other contexts: by rule, cinema would participate in vilifying an ideology, a
worldview or a way of conduct, by embodying it in the bad girls and women defined primarily
by their flamboyant, uncontrolled, and promiscuous sexuality (e.g. Jacobs, 1995; Kuhn, 1988;
Staiger, 1996). The good revolutionary girls and women of the early partisan films were
accordingly contrasted to the images of the ideologically-and-sexually fallen or bad women:
whereas the former kept their sexuality within the limits of socialist values and order as
determined by reason, morality, and self-awareness, the bad women unrestrainedly succumbed to
their lowest sexual impulses and sided with the Nazis and other enemies of socialism, who were
also characterized in terms of decadent, licentious, and pathological sexuality.
It suffices to check out Slavica where the local pre-war bourgeoisie makes a natural ally
to the Italian and German occupying forces. The images of the working-class poverty, but also of
the revolutionary commitment, are contrasted with the decadent bourgeois party, where the erotic
unrestraint fuses with music, dance, and alcohol, all under the sign of the naked female body
utterly overwhelmed by ecstasy (FIGURE 3.21–22). When the wealthy city folks enthusiastically
welcome the Fascist town administrator and commander, it is the bourgeoisie women who excel
with their welcome: they exchange flirting gazes with the officer, surround him and take him to
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his quarters (FIGURE 3.23–24).
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FIGURE 3.21–22 The bourgeois nightlife in Slavica
FIGURE 3.23–24 The female collaborationists in Slavica
The Flag offers the most spectacular rendition of the obscenity of the link between Nazism and
flamboyant amoral sexuality. We have already seen that the film unmistakably designated
Vuksan as the obscene sexual predator who is after Marija, and the ultimate illustration of his
amorality is provided by the scene where he orchestrates the wild, drunken party with several
ustaša officers and apparent prostitutes. The scene is a jumble of music, tobacco smoke, drunken
bodies dancing, and obscene female laughter. Vuksan sadistically mistreats one of his
concubines, grabbing her neck, pushing her to her knees and pulling her hair, yet she does not
remark; apparently, it is their sexual routine. The bacchanalias culminates when Vuksan orders
that the two prisoners who were accused of supporting the communist insurgents be brought out:
as the villain with his demonic threats of killing the prisoners, the drunken ladies humiliate them
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as well (FIGURE 3.25–28).
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FIGURE 3.25–28 The ustaša bacchanalias in The Flag
To be sure, the image of the fallen women, often coupled with the Nazi/quisling villains,
remained an unsurprising staple of the WWII/partisan films for some time, and sometimes in the
films that are set in the early post-war period, and vilify the remnants of the pre-war bourgeoisie,
e.g. in Priča u fabrici/Story of a Factory (1948, Vladimir Pogačić), and Poslednji dan/The Last
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Day (1951, Vladimir Pogačić). Far more surprising – and to the best of my knowledge
completely unexplored – is the tendency of the gradual yet constant de-stigmatization of these
problematic, collaborationist femininity, or, rather, of the female eroticism as such. In my view,
the earliest illustration of this tendency is to be found in Immortal Youth. As we have already
seen, the film features a Gestapo officer, who makes advances at the revolutionary heroine; also,
the film screens some of the night life of Belgrade during the wartime: the Gestapo officer is
only one of the Nazis who visit the night club, and drink with their girls or prostitutes (FIGURE
3.29–30).
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FIGURE 3.29–30 The women collaborationists in Immoral Youth
However, the central act of the night club scene belongs to a dancer – an anonymous, episodic
character – who performs her tap-dance number. Although there is no doubt that her
performance is a segment of the spectacle that, at is most general, can be seen as a bourgeois
frivolity and the collaborationist activity, the manner in which the act is framed does not invest it
with ideological resentment, like the one that is at play in the images of the obscenely laughing
bar ladies. The camera captures the tap-dance act in a fly-on-the-wall fashion (FIGURE 3.31– 32).
The act is a testimony to the performer’s skill, not to her alleged or supposed ideological
sympathies. It is as if the girl’s act – her enjoyment in the dance as such – briefly opens a space
beyond the stark dichotomy that forces the woman to choose between good revolutionary
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femininity and the bad collaborationist one.
FIGURE 3.31–32 The tap dancer in Immortal Youth
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3.5.1. Uncle Žvane
The next, far more elaborated example of this tendency can be found in Barba Žvane/Uncle
Žvane (1949, Vjekoslav Afrić). One of the most critically maligned films of the period, it follows
the titular old peasant who undertakes a 100 km long trip with a herd of ox, in order to provide
the food for the starving partisans. Travelling by foot across the occupied territory, Žvane is
caught by the Nazis guarding a mountain outpost. Žvane’s imprisonment occupies the central 20odd minutes of the film, and the most prominent protagonist of that segment is not Žvane or his
capturers, but Nineta, an Italian bar singer from a nearby town, who arrives to the outpost to
entertain the soldiers by singing and dancing with them. Shortly after her arrival, Nineta is
horrified when she notices how the commander Rostner maltreats the old man, demanding him
to disclose the location of the partisans; when Rostner – the most villainous character in the film
– takes Žvane at gun point, Nineta even jumps in between the two and forces the Nazi to spare
Žvane’s life (FIGURE 3.33–34).
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FIGURE 3.33–34 Ninetta saves Žvane from Rostner in Uncle Žvane
As the old man remains tied up in the corner of the cabin, he becomes a spectator of the mini
drama of love and jealousy, which plays out in front of him. Whereas Rostner is attracted to
Nineta, she is far more interested in the young soldier Fritz. In the evening, at the party, Rostner
notices that Nineta gazes at Fritz, as if she is singing specifically to him. When the young soldier,
who is himself attracted to Nineta, starts dancing with her, Rostner jealously slaps him and sends
him outside to stand guard. Nineta continues to sing and dance with all the soldiers, enticing
them to drink too much (FIGURE 3.35–36). When all the soldiers gets drunk and fall asleep, she
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goes out, finds the young soldier, and they head to the woods where they kiss and make love
(FIGURE 3.37–38). In the meantime, Žvane sets himself free, and runs away from the outpost
with his bovine herd.
FIGURE 3.35–38 Nineta seduces the Nazi soldiers, and leaves after Fritz in Uncle Žvane
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Nineta was an unprecedented figure in Yugoslav cinema due to her profound ambiguity: she was
the first woman who obviously enjoys the company of the occupiers and makes love to them,
and yet, at the same time, she was a far cry from being depicted as an amoral villainess. Not only
does she save Žvane’s life, thus displaying humanity and bravery, but is also an independent
woman who knows what she wants and knows how to get it. She is not impressed with power, as
illustrated by her disregard for the commander, but apparently follows her heart. Moreover, her
feelings for the young soldier de-stigmatize him to an extent. The underdog and the beauty who
oppose to the supreme brute cannot but arouse sympathies, despite their (supposed) nominal
ideology; under the cloak of the night they become lovers, whose passion paves the way for
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Žvane’s escape. The purity of their love, then, makes them effectively complicit with the main
protagonist – who, at one point, also had looked smitten with a sight of their romance.
FIGURE 3.39–42 The socialist-realist glamour: Nineta as diva in Uncle Žvane
One aspect of Nineta’s persona should be particularly stressed: she is a glamorous woman –
indeed, the closest that Yugoslav cinema came to the notion of a diva in those early days. Unlike
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the prostitutes and harpies in Slavica and The Flag, she is anything but a caricature: the beauty of
this brunette is genuine and apparently moulded after the female stars of the 1940s. As she
croons “Besame mucho” to her lover, the camera frames her in a close-up that connotes
adoration, not scorn (FIGURE 3.39–42). Again, just like in Immortal Youth, the feminine virtue
surfaces through a performance that, although exercised in front of the audience, suggests the
profound feminine enjoyment that is not limited to the public appearance: this time it is not a
dance, but a song. Just as the commander fears that the song is not meant for him but for another
man, one could assume that Nineta’s singing ultimately does not aim to please the men, but is a
self-sufficient activity, i.e. the act that connotes the self-sufficient dimension of the feminine
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enjoyment (jouissance, in Lacanese). As Renata Salecl reminds us (1998, pp. 59–78), it is not for
nothing that the song of the Sirens offers one of the paradigmatic examples of this jouissance:
their singing is both highly seductive and lethal for the men, suggesting the Sirens’ independence
and self-sufficiency. In a way, any woman who enjoys singing or dancing is on a verge of
immersing herself in this type of jouissance, which, ultimately, is perceived as socially
dangerous as it reveals the woman’s self-sufficiency and challenges the rapport between the
women and the men as natural.
3.5.2. The Red Flower
My final illustration in this subchapter comes from Crveni cvet/The Red Flower (1950, Gustav
Gavrin), a film that renders the destinies of the soldiers of the Yugoslav royalist army captured in
April 1941, and interned in a POW camp in Germany. Anything but a homogenous group, the
soldiers are diversified in terms of age, military status, and, foremost, ideology. The central
antagonism does not pit the Yugoslavs against the Germans, but the prisoners of the communist
and anti-fascist bent with those who share monarchist affiliation, and side with the Nazis in the
ongoing attempts to squash the communist cell in the camp.
In the second part of the film, the prisoners launch a revue that brings some joy to their
fellow inmates, but also serves as a testimony to their resistance. The musical acts are actually
vitriolic jokes on the Nazi values, which target the German officers who attend the show in the
first row as the special guests. The number that I am especially interested in here – the one that is
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also accentuated by the film – offers the first remarkable queer motif in the early, socialist-realist
Yugoslav cinema: a communist prisoner sings and poses as a glamorous woman. The act
encapsulates the Hollywood-style spectacle: in the bar setting, we first spot the bartender and a
gentleman in a white suit who sits on a bar stool, nonchalantly enjoying a glass of brandy and a
cigar. A female figure steps into the frame from the right and stars singing as she approaches the
man in white: we first see her black contour from the back, and when she turns away from the
man toward the camera, we realize that it is a guy with a wig, heavy makeup, in a dress, striking
a full-blown diva posture. The man in white lustfully gazes down at the bar siren and listens to
“The Bar Song [Barska pesma]”, a sorrowful tune about longing and desire (FIGURE 3.43–46).
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The “bar lady” act is as good as it gets in the improvised theatre in the POW camp. “She” boasts
with fairly impressive make up and a lanky body, with properly thin waist, not to mention
convincing moves and – above all – fascinating voice (the scene was actually dubbed by a
female singer). The audience is amazed, and even the Nazi officers appear to be flabbergasted.
The self-reflexivity of the act is unambiguous: what we see is not merely a glamorous
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performance but performing the glamour.
FIGURE 3.43–46 The revolutionary cross-dresser in Red Flower
The bar lady will be back on stage one more time, in the final act, when she joins the characters
from the other numbers to sing the closing song. “Her” performance, thus, does not stand up
alone as a cross-dressing curio, but figures as a part of the more complex series of performances
that also play on other types of identifications, most prominently racial ones. What follows the
bar lady act is an equally unabashed number, where several prisoners perform a blackface act,
impersonating the American black slaves who decry the exploitation by the white masters, and
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eventually rise up and free themselves. The tradition of blackface – itself a form of racial crossdressing, in which the whites put on the insignias of the black race (Rogin, 1998, p. 30) – is
famously and justly controversial, for it can be seen as promulgating or subverting racism – all
depending on the context and reception. However, staged in the context of antifascist resistance
in The Red Flower, the act is unambiguously about the genuine interracial political identification
par excellence: the pro-communist prisoners translate their resistance to the Nazi politics in the
mutiny of the black slaves in the antebellum South. In other words, the antifascist resistance reappropriates the tradition of the black resistance, by reinventing it as its predecessor: the song
sung by the performers is not an original slave song, but is written by the prisoners themselves –
an all too obvious slap to the racist politics of Nazism.56
One could say that the revolutionary appropriation of the glamorous femininity should be
seen in the same way: a product of the capitalist/bourgeois system, the glamorous spectacle,
nevertheless, has a utopian potential.57 Indeed, the cross-gender and cross-racial identifications
intertwine in the final act, when “the bar lady” – just as several prisoners who were performing
as majorettes – joins “the blacks” and some others performers masked as the ethnic stereotypes;
all of them joyfully embrace on the stage as they singing about international solidarity and
universal humanity. After applauding courteously, the Nazi officer who was sitting in the front
row as a special guest, suggests to the director of the show that “the Chinese coolie should be
removed away from the white woman”, to what the director responds wittily: “I think that the
mister colonel would not mind if, in order to preserve the colour-variety of the characters, we
replace the Chinaman with a Japanese?” The Red Flower revue thus vividly illustrates Richard
Dyer’s argument that we should not deem stereotypes as necessarily pejorative or politically
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regressive (1993, pp. 11–18): the Nazi officer knows very well that he faces the most patent
stereotypes, and yet he gets provoked by them, perfectly aware that even such a shabby spectacle
56
The representation of the black persons in Yugoslav cinema is a topic that begs for a study in its own right, but
the images of blackness, by rule, connote internationalism, inviting interracial identification and solidarity. The first
black person in a Yugoslav feature film appears in Life is Ours (1948, Gustav Gavrin): in what seems to be an insert
of documentary footage (most probably from Brčko–Banovići, Gavrin’s documentary about the post-war mass
labour action of building the titular railroad), we see an anonymous smiling black man, a member of an international
labour brigade. The most famous black person in the classical Yugoslav cinema is the US sergeant Jim, the
protagonist of Dolina miru/Valley of Peace (1956, France Štiglic). This guardian angel figure of the two war
orphans was played by an American actor John Kitzmiller.
57
I draw here on the dialectics of the ideological and the utopian, as elaborated by Fredric Jameson (2002).
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still channels meanings and values that challenge his ideology, i.e. even these crass stereotypes
outline the antifascist politics.
How far should we go in appraising such surprising overlapping of the revolutionary
struggle, the cross-dressing as an exemplary queer practice, and destigmatization of the
glamorous femininity? One could easily come up with a much more pessimistic reading that
would tone down the link between them. For example, it would suffice to recall that the revue
was supposed to distract the Nazis, so that a communist inmate can sneak into the camp
administration offices and destroy the lists of his incriminated fellows. Moreover, before the
revue, the leader of the communist prisoners explicitly stresses that its most important act will
happen “behind the scene”.58 However, to stick to these facts, correct as they may be, is to miss
that the show eventually outgrows its original instrumental function. For, even if the revue is
conceived as a ruse to keep the Nazis away from the communists’ secret mission, the ardour that
the performers invest in it and its effects on the audience elevate the show from being merely “a
means to an end” to an end in itself. This transformation of the revue from a pure charade into an
authentic act of resistance is marked with the most remarkable formal feature that is linked
precisely to the representation of cross-dressing: the cross-dressers do not serve as a laughing
stock. The bar-lady act never slips into a caricature or comic relief, but keeps a melancholic aura
of a glamorous diva. The majorettes’ number certainly lacks the melancholic gloss of the bar act,
yet, their cross-dressing itself is also not to be laughed at: the audience surely laughs, but not at
the majorettes, but with them, for it is the Nazis who are the butt of the joke again.
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3.6.
Femininity as a mediating agency
These examples of the virtuous glamour testify that the gradual absolution of the
“fallen”/collaborationist femininity significantly destabilized the black-and-white divide in the
WWII/partisan films already during the period of the naive or heroic romanticism, i.e. of the
socialist-realist phase of Yugoslav cinema. The process continued in the years in which socialist
realism in the Yugoslav films became the residual, the WWII/partisan genre lost the status of the
most present domestic genre, and the idealized heroes were de-romanticized.
58
With regard to this strategic employment of the queer spectacle, Red Flower anticipates the classic WWII film
about the prisoners of war, David Lean’s The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957).
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3.6.1. I Was Stronger
I have already proposed that we can take 1953 as the watershed moment in these developments
and have illustrated it with the rightly famous Distant is the Sun. Now, let me additionally
exemplify it another partisan film made the same year: it is Gustav Gavrin’s third and last feature
film Bila sam jača/I Was Stronger. The film follows Marija, the partisan who, masked as the
peasant woman, leaves the woods and heads to a small town secretly to pick up the urgently
needed medicine from a local pharmacist, the communist supporter. However, at the very
moment when she takes over the stash of the medicine, the police raids the pharmacy; trying to
escape, Marija finds herself in the flat that belongs to the very quisling head of police Mile, who
orchestrated the manhunt. Mile’s wife Zora accepts the unknown woman in the household, as she
believes her to be a housemaid that she was expecting expecting. The film thus apparently
becomes an exercise in suspense: will Marija manage to keep her cover before she sneaks away
from the wolf’s lair? And yet, this situation paves the way for a far more sombre drama – the
central drama of the film – starts to unravel. The little son of Mile and Zora is seriously ill and
his condition rapidly deteriorates, due to a wrong diagnosis and lack of medicine. Accordingly,
the film transforms Zora from the bossy wife of the quisling administrator to a committed mother
who would do anything to save her child; also, we gradually find out that Marija is actually a
doctor, and thus the only person who can make the correct diagnosis and help the boy with the
serum, which she injects to the boy unbeknownst to his parents. When he reveals her true
identity, Mile remains a zealous quisling head of police. He mercilessly informs Marija that he
will imprison and punish her, but that she has to help the boy anyway as her professional ethics
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obliges her. Zora, for her part, promises to Marija that Mile will let her go once she helps the
child; when her husband refuses to confirm that, she is disgusted by his behaviour, accuses him
that he puts his job before his son’s life, and she even hits him (FIGURE 3.47–48). She pleads to
Marija as one woman/mother to another, regardless of the ideological worldviews that might
separate them. When she realizes that Marija had helped the boy at the right moment, she helps
her to leave the flat. As they depart, they do not utter a word, but exchange telling gazes (FIGURE
3.49–50).
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FIGURE 3.47–50 Zora’s shifting allegiances
It does not take much to discern and praise Marija’s actions: she is a female revolutionary
heroine that still fits the socialist-realist mould, just like Mile belongs to the gallery of the toxic
villains that are beyond absolution. However, it is the character of Zora that challenges the sharp
divide between the revolutionary heroine and the quisling villain. Her character is coded in a
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highly gendered way: she is first and foremost a mother. From a feminist perspective, then, Zora
– i.e. the motherhood that she embodies – remains highly ambiguous. On one hand, her maternal
femininity most certainly caters to the traditional notion of the motherhood as the natural essence
of femininity, something that supposedly persists beyond the transient socio-ideological
conditions, and yet it still empowers some women as it carries a specific symbolic capital and is
constantly engaged in the different socio-ideological antagonisms, contradictions, and tensions.
If we stick to this vantage, we could say that the film privileges the status of motherhood as
meta-ideological: despite belonging to the different ideological worldviews, Zora and Marija are
women/mothers and thus share the profound, substantial understanding that remains
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unfathomable for the men/fathers. The irony underlying this reading is a rather obvious: although
it posits the motherhood as meta-ideological, this vantage is the ideology at its purest.
However, the film offers a plenty of material for the opposite or, rather, complementary
reading – and that is what makes it more ambiguous in the feminist optics. This second reading
insists that the mother is a far cry from a firm, consistent and universal category. True, Zora is
certainly a mother at the very beginning of the film just as she is at its end, but she is not the one
and the same mother at these two moments: the whole ordeal transforms her substantially,
making her deeply aware of the solidarity hitherto unknown; it is precisely this transformation
that inscribes her in the revolutionary project as someone who is effectively not the ideological
enemy (collaborationist).
3.6.2. The Last Bridge
Distant is the Sun and I was Stronger were quickly followed by a film, which made another
remarkable step – indeed the most remarkable one – in challenging the great divide in the early
1950s. This was Poslednji most/Die letzte Brücke/The Last Bridge, the only partisan film in 1954
and the first Yugoslav international co-production. The major co-producer was the Austrian film
company Kosmopol Film made it with the Belgrade-based UFUS, hiring the “denazified”
German director Helmut Käutner, as well as German and Austrian film stars like Maria Schell,
Bernhard Wicki, Barbara Rüttig and Carl Möhner. Schell plays Helga, a young nurse who works
in the hospital of the German troops stationed in Herzegovina. The nexus of love and ideology
confirms her allegiance to the Nazi cause in the beginning of the film: she is in love with a Nazi
trooper Martin, and deems the partisans as not much more than animals. The partisans soon
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kidnap her as a person who could save their own mortally wounded doctor; when he dies, they
force Helga to stay with them and do his job. This is an uneasy alliance, forced by circumstance,
rather than true desire for reconciliation. However, gradually yet irreversibly, Helga starts
understanding the motivation of her captors, and eventually identifies with them. In the last
segment of the film, during the mission to bring the medicine to the partisans, Helga meets
Martin, who cannot believe that she is still alive and effectively sided with the enemy. Although
Helga is still in love with him, she decides to get back to the partisans and bring them the
medicine. Her partisan commander understands that she is torn apart between her love and the
newly developed commitment for the partisan struggle, and lets her decide to go back to the
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German side. On her way back, Helga dies on no man’s land, on the bridge separating – but also
connecting – the partisan and Nazi side.
The Last Bridge is a veritable illustration how the conditions of production, usually
perceived as the extraneous to the “filmic text”, actually most directly shape that text – i.e., that
there is no real substantial, clear-cut line between text and its context. For all developments in
challenging the “Us vs. Them” divide in Yugoslav cinema, it is highly improbable that the
domestic filmmakers would make a film about the Nazi nurse who sympathizes with the partisan
cause and whose heart breaks as she cannot decide where she belongs. A story like that
apparently courted more to the Austrian and German filmmakers: it goes without saying that they
could not tarnish the partisan struggle and the eventual victory, but they still could show that not
all Germans merely Nazi beasts. The figure of Helga is thus a symptomatic combination – i.e. a
compromise formation – between a bad German and a good German, a character that embodies
the intra-German negotiation and reconciliation with regard to its WWII legacy and the post-war
identity. It is thus not surprising that the film steered a controversy among Yugoslav film critics,
many of which caustically dismissed it as the film that is much more needed by the Germans
than by the Yugoslavs. For all its sound and fury, however, the ideological discrediting of the
film in Yugoslavia did not have far-reaching and long-termed effects. The Last Bridge met a
generally favourable international reception – Schell won the special mention in Cannes that year
for the role of Helga – and did not thwart the increasing openness of Yugoslav cinema for the
international co-productions.
Even if the film’s representation of WWII was perceived by some – or even by many – as
a German vantage, it nevertheless interrelated with the other cinematic representations of the
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war, some of them Yugoslav, some from other national cinemas (including Hollywood). That
interrelation was anything but one of sheer antagonism: the film was hardly at odds with the
collective memory of WWII maintained by the Yugoslav communists. For example, The Last
Bridge defines the partisan struggle first and foremost in terms of the absolute care for the
wounded soldiers: no matter how disastrous circumstances, the partisan unit never leaves its
wounded and ill soldiers behind. It is precisely this ethics of care that triggers Maria’s
identification with the people she had originally considered non-human. This emphasis on the
partisan care was absolutely in sync with the hierarchy of values that Yugoslav communists
posited in their own accounts of WWII. The film also accentuates the international solidarity of
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the partisan movement: early in the film, a German doctor questions the authenticity of the
Yugoslav resistance, as the partisans fight under the sign of the red star which is not a traditional
or authentic insignia of the local people. The fact that the Nazi doctor does not besmirch the red
star as the sign of communism or bolshevism but precisely of internationalism is telling itself.
The only main aspect of the partisan struggle that remains unspecified in the film is the specific
socialist/communist ideological core of the partisan struggle; i.e. the film goes at length
designating and praising the partisans as the brave and selfless combatants for the national
liberation, but never really acknowledges them as the revolutionaries. However, in that specific
regard, The Last Bridge actually did not substantially differ from many Yugoslav partisan films:
in all of its urgency and immediacy, the antifascist struggle was primarily rendered as the war of
national or people’s liberation, whereas the revolutionary dimension was often merely implied.
After the revolutionary aspect of the war was most accentuated in the films of the administrative
period, Yugoslav cinema followed the suit in giving the upper hand to the vicissitudes of the
antifascist combat over its revolutionary program. The Last Bridge is illustrative of that trend,
not exceptional or antithetical to it.
Although symptomatic of the German and Austrian post-war anxiety, the image of Maria
nevertheless irrevocably entered and influenced the Yugoslav cinematic imaginary as well,
additionally softening the “Us vs. Them” divide. She was the very first example that “they” can
understand “us”, i.e. a celluloid proof, as it were, that the values that fuelled the partisan
resistance were so universal that even the occupiers can identify with them to an extent (of
course, unless they are utterly drenched in the fascist and Nazi ideology). However, gender
remains the crucial part of the formula: at that point in Yugoslav cinema it was still impossible to
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have a male protagonist who belongs to the WWII occupiers and then sides with the partisans or
empathizes with their values. It was the women characters – or, specific types of femininity –
who were crossing the line between the two ideological stances, or, to put it otherwise, revealing
that there are other, more complicated subjective positions than a singlehanded support for an
ideological cause. Not surprisingly, the romance remained the sphere of human experience that
was rendered as often incommensurable with the ideological imperatives. After The Last Bridge,
i.e. from 1955 on, the use of friction between love and ideology in order to replace the blackand-white divide with the many shades in the WWII/partisan films was anything but incidental.
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3.7.
Familial troubles
3.7.1. Don’t Turn Round, Son and Under Suspicion
Chronologically, the year of 1955 saw the first example of that in Ešalon doktora M./Echelon of
Doctor M., Žika Mitrović’s debut feature; however, as I will discuss this film together with other
Mitrović’s films in more detail below, I will turn now to two important films that came shortly
after it: Ne okreći se, sine/Don’t Turn Round, Son (1956, Branko Bauer), and Pod
sumnjom/Under Suspicion (1956, Branko Belan).
Don’t Turn Round, Son, one of the most acclaimed classical Yugoslav films (e.g. Gilić, 2010),
follows Neven Novak, the engineer from Zagreb and the member of the resistance, who escapes
from the train that takes him to Jasenovac, the most notorious death camp in Croatia. However,
taking the cue from the aforementioned images of the elusive femininity that traverses the “Us vs.
Them” divide, let me first address the character of the main female protagonist: it is Neven’s
former lover Vera, a beautiful blond whom he did not seen since he was imprisoned. Assuming
that the ustaša police will look for him at his home, Neven does not visit his family first, but
goes to Vera’s place. Although she is happy to see him, she quickly admits having a love affair
with an attractive German officer; she also informs him that his small son ended up in ustaša
orphanage, from where Neven is about to save him in the course of the film. Neven caustically
notices that Vera took the radio from his old house, but that she was not willing to take Zoran
with her; he also ferociously pushes her hand away while leaving the apartment. And yet, when
she asks her disillusioned old lover “Forgive me [Oprosti]”, he melts; presumably, the audience
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is expected to do the same. Indeed, although pursuing an affair with the Nazi officer, Vera will
remain loyal to Neven until the end. When the ustaša agents storm her flat and ask her about
Neven’s whereabouts, Vera points them in the wrong direction; that way, she buys Neven some
more time to kidnap Zoran from the training barracks where he is indoctrinated to become a
young fascist. Later, when the agents realize that she tricked them, they threaten her with the
brutal inquisition. At that moment, Vera summons her Nazi fiancé, who is superior to the ustaša
agents. The film thus uses Vera’s affair with the Nazi officer to make a significant gradation
among the villains, putting the ustaša regime at the top of the hierarchy of evil: in comparison
with the ustaša thugs, even the Nazis seem a less despicable and even desirable.
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And yet, Vera is well aware of the troubling dimension of her status. In one scene, she is
visited by Matilda, the mother of Neven’s former friend who is now ustaša; this motherly figure
eagerly wants to help Neven. Faced with the old woman’s momentary silence, Vera reads it as a
silent accusation aimed at her, and bitterly reacts: “I know what you think: that I am a Kraut’s
whore! Well, I am, so what? I guess that I should have died from hunger or kept [Neven] at my
place, so I would be killed together with him? [Znam šta si mislite: da sam švapska drolja! Pa i
jesam, pa šta? Valjda sam trebala krepat od gladi ili ga zadržat kod mene da i mene ubiju s
njime?]” Given that Matilda’s silence is more an expression of her desperation than anything else,
Vera projects on the old lady her own remorse and anger: the rant is at the same time selfaccusation and justification. Her last words in the film, addressed to the ustaša agents halted by
the fact that she is a fiancée of the Nazi major, are illustrative in this regard: “There are people
whom you catch, and there are people who do not let themselves to be caught. [Ima ljudi koje
hvatate, a ima ljudi koji se ne daju uhvatiti.]” Apparently, in the chaos of the war, Vera prefers to
see herself as belonging to the latter group. She does not define that position in ideological terms,
but first and foremost pragmatically: it is an elemental outline for survival. For example, one
could suppose that Vera entered a love affair with a Nazi officer precisely in order to protect
herself from the possible charges that she had been a lover of a communist activist. The film
depicts the ustaša regime as the one in which no one who knows a communist is safe: the ustaša
agents eventually zero in on Matilda, disrespecting her old age and disregarding the fact that she
is the mother of Ivica, an exemplary ustaša trooper.
The discord between Matilda (and her equally benevolent husband) on one side, and their
son Ivica who betrays his old friend Neven on another side, reminds us of another gender-related
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motif that destabilizes the black-and-white divide: the familial relations. The antagonism
between the good parents and their despicable son chimes with the main relationship in the film:
the one between Neven and his son Zoran. In contrast to Neven’s revolutionary commitment,
Zoran is raised as an enthusiastic ustaša and an anti-Semite: in the training barracks he is taught
to hate and kill. The boy even dreams that his father, whom he does not remember, is actually an
ustaša hero. In a case of the bitter irony, Neven must not dispel that fantasy in order to get the
boy away from the barracks and take him to the partisans. Branko Bauer did not opt for easy
solutions in that regard: intent to make difficult the audience’s sympathy for Zoran by casting a
boy who does not have angelic face, but actually resembled none other but Ante Pavelić, the
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supreme ustaša leader (Polimac, 1985, p. 75). Also, Zoran does not swiftly give up on the ustaša
ideology, but for the most of the film indulges in the fascist zeal with the honesty of a child. The
moment when he realizes that his father is actually the archenemy – the partisan – the boy is
devastated. Suddenly overwhelmed with the fear and hate, he tries to run away from him; Neven
immediately catches him and when the boy explicitly refuses to listen to him, he slaps and
kidnaps him for the second time, as it were – this time against Zoran’s will. Only in the film’s
finale, when Neven’s death is imminent, Zoran finally comes to terms with the father who does
the last sacrificial gesture: he orders the son to run into the woods where the partisans are,
whereas he remains behind him and dies covering him from the ustaša’s chase.
Under Suspicion also destabilizes the “Us vs. Them” divide along both the romantic and the
familial plot. The film’s main protagonist is Andro Narančić, the young communist from
Dalmatia, who in the opening, pre-credit scene escapes from the Italian prison with three of his
comrades. As his buddies die on the run, he is the only one who manages to get back on his
island occupied by Italian forces. And yet, it is only at that point that his troubles begin: his
partisan colleagues do not believe his story about the escape, but think that the Italians co-opted
Andro and sent him so he could spy for them. In a proper Hitchcockian fashion, Andro has to
prove his innocence and ideological allegiance, in the face of the evidence planted by the film’s
two main antagonists: his own uncle Zane Moro, who is a quisling city official (prefetto civile),
and Nikola, Andro’s communist comrade who is a real traitor.
Belan originally intended to keep the audience in the dark regarding Andro’s act and
motivation: did he really escape the camp or is he a traitor? However, the committee of censors
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found it too problematic, and demanded the opening sequence that would make Andro’s positive
profile crystal clear from the start. And yet, even with Andro’s spotless ideological profile,
Under Suspicion boasts a whole spectrum of shades between Good and Evil. The partisan bunch
ranges from Andro and the characters that still trust him, to his former friends who slowly turn
back to him, to the ultimate villain of the film, the traitor Nikola. The love and jealousy
additionally instigate the discord among the partisans. Siba, the partisan leader who believes that
Andro is a traitor, does not rationally hold that belief. The films goes at lengths to illustrate that
the main reason for Siba’s antagonism toward Andro is their old dispute over Veronika, who
used to be in love with Siba, but eventually left him for Andro. Hence, love remains utterly
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ambiguous force. Just as his love for Veronika and jealousy for Andro triggered Siba’s wrong
decisions, the unconditional love of Veronika and Andro saves the day, and enables the partisans
eventually to grasp the reality and stop their plans that were based on misinformation.
On the other side, the film offers two types of the Italian soldiers: captain Orlando and his
unit of ordinary soldiers are juxtaposed to Fiasco and his black-shirted Fascist zealots. As we
see, the contrast between the leaders of the Italian formations is connoted already with their
names: whereas the captain’s name signifies courage, nobility, and culture in general (Orlando
Furioso), Fiasco is a sleazy, brutish lowlife, despised by capitano. Love substantially influences
the difference between Orlando and Fiasco: whereas the latter is reduced to the bestial eroticism
(the casual sex with the local prostitutes), the chief characteristic of Orlando is his romance with
Andro’s sister Marija. Although Andro is a far cry from being happy when he finds out about the
two, Orlando will help him to obtain the original warrant testifying that Andro has ran from the
camp. Capitano is introduced on screen in a telltale way. When Andro sneaks into his bedroom
to steal his gun, we see Orlando in bed, the heart of the domestic and familial realm, far from the
battlefield and robbed of uniform or any military insignia (he wears a pajama). Although caught
unprotected and at gunpoint, Orlando is self-assured and without a trace of discomfort (let alone
of some antagonistic feeling); he gallantly provides Andro with the warrant. The wrongly
accused man is deeply moved as this gesture discloses that the enemy soldier trusts him more
than many of his own comrades.
With the figure of Orlando, Under Suspicion sets what will become one of the most
visible and popular representations in Yugoslav cinema: the good-hearted and amiable Italian
soldier as the unwilling occupier. This representation chimes with the myth of Italiani brava
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gente, which designates Italians not as active agents of the Axis politics but its victims and
opponents. The myth was based on the assumption that “While the Germans had wanted the war,
Italians had been dragged unwilling into it by Mussolini and had soon become its victims. The
Italians were ‘brava gente’ (‘nice folks’) who hated Mussolini, while the Germans loved Hitler
and were condemned en bloc as ‘hideous Teutons’” (Giovacchini 2007: 55–56). Hence, unlike
the German soldiers who were true believers in the Nazi cause and thus brutal monsters, the
Italian soldiers were, in words of Filippo Focardi, “‘good Samaritans who, plunged into a crazy
war against their will, fraternized with the peoples of the countries invaded by Mussolini, aided
these people in time of hunger and misery and, above all, protected them from the violence of the
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Germans, thus saving many lives, including thousands of Jews’” (quoted in Giovacchini 2007:
56). Yugoslav cinema had a fair share of the nice Italian soldiers. Their most famous
incarnations appear in the two popular two 1969 films: the explosive expert and bomber
Zavattoni in the actioner Most/The Bridge (1969, Hajrudin Krvavac), and captain Michele Riva
in the partisan behemoth The Battle of Neretva (1969, Veljko Bulajić), the latter being played by
Franco Nero, the ultimate embodiment of Italian manliness this side of Marcello Mastroianni.
Guided by anti-fascism as their true ideological choice, both Zavattoni and Riva leave the Italian
forces, join the partisans, and sacrifice their lives in combat against the Nazis. However, one
should not wait for the late 1960s for representations like these: one year after Under Suspicion
only, Tudja zemlja/The Land of the Others (1957, Jože Gale) featured as its central protagonist,
as it were, a band of seven Italian soldiers who, starved and lost in the Bosnian woods, try to find
their way back to Adriatic coast when they find out about their country’s capitulation. A motley
crew of different sensibilities, the band slowly dissolves in antagonisms, the principal being the
one between the good-hearted and pacifist soldier Marko and the vicious colonel. Again, love
serves as the principal marker of virtue: after falling in love with the partisan girl, who is
wounded by the colonel, Marko decides to join the partisans. When the Colonel kills Marko in
the final shootout, Marko’s best friend, the unit’s doctor, will join the partisans.
Back to Under Suspicion: unlike Vera in Don’t Turn Back, Son, who was willing to
become a “German whore” in the eyes of her neighbours only to pull through the war, Marija
develops a genuine love for Orlando. That does not spare her from the wrath of the local partisan
supporters, who cut her hair in an exemplary act of retribution against women who had love or
sexual affairs with the occupying soldiers. The film does not have the scene of cutting the hair,
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and it seems that Belan did not intend in the first place; instead, he planned a dialogue in which
Marija, whom at the start of the film we see with her long hair, tells Andro about the act of
violent retribution when he sees that her hair is cut. However, the dialogue scene itself was
eventually cut out,59 and the only proof of vengeance acted upon Marija is the short fringe
protruding from under her headscarf.
The Narančić family is another collective that is as suffused with the gray tones as the
Italian and the partisan ones. As a matter of fact, it is already his familial background as such that
59
In his otherwise detailed account on Under Suspicion, Nenad Polimac (2005) does not reveal whether Belan
cut the scene in accordance with the strict order of the censorship committee, or whether he did it on his own, as he
later admitted cutting out more material than the committee ordered.
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makes Andro a perfect suspect from the partisan perspective: the house of Narančić – as was the
title of the original play from which the film was adapted – is renowned but declining lineage of
the ship owners and captains. The war halted the family business for a time being, yet it is the
socialist revolution that would give it a mortal blow. Both Zane Moro and Nikola use this fact as
an assumption upon which they build the lie about Andro’s betrayal of the revolution: being born
into a rich family, it is no wonder that he eventually gives up on the communism in the prison
camp. The family is not fractured only along ideological lines: the radical inter-generational gap
between Andro and his father culminates in the latter’s death; the class question also pops up as
Moro is a hideous social climber who married Andro’s aunt to creep into the prestigious family;
however, as he needs Andro to keep the family business going, he desperately tries to undermine
the young man’s devotion for the partisans and their ideology. The variety of these intersections
of gender, class, age, and ideology makes Under Suspicion a showcase example of a nuanced
classical partisan film.
3.7.2. The “Kosovo westerns” of Žika Mitrović
The partisan films made by Žika Mitrović were indisputably the most popular classical WWIIset films and the films that most remarkably and persistently destabilized the “Us vs. Them”
divide. Also, it must be noticed that Mitrović’s readiness to complicate his plots with many
shades of grey extends beyond the limits of the partisan genre. Consider his 1957 feature Potraži
Vandu Kos/Look for Vanda Kos, a whodunit-thriller that is set in the post-war period, and yet
focuses on the war past. Olga comes to the post-war Sarajevo to find out who is responsible for
the wartime betrayal of her brother Pavle, a member of the local resistance, who ended up in
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Jasenovac. As she contacts the people who knew Pavle, including his colleagues from the
resistance movement, Olga becomes aware that they hide something from her. As the
fabrications pile up, she concludes that Pavle was betrayed by his closest colleagues who
survived the war as the respectable fighters for freedom. Olga decides to expose the whole
conspiracy, but eventually finds out that Pavle was not betrayed by his colleagues, but by Ivka,
the girl who was had a teenage crush on him during the war. Ivka was particularly jealous of
Pavle’s girlfriend Vanda; unaware that Vanda, employed in the Nazi headquarters, is actually a
member of resistance, Ivka blurted out about her and Pavle’s relation in front of her ustaša uncle,
who connected the dots and imprisoned both Pavle and Vanda. After realizing the consequences
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of her act, Ivka suffered the mental breakdown. Apparently recovered, she remained deeply
troubled. The main aim of Pavle’s colleagues’ “conspiracy”, thus, was to protect Ivka from
additional inquiry that would trigger a new breakdown. The girl and her misfortunate act
apparently operate beyond the good vs. evil dichotomy: Pavle’s tragic ending was caused not by
Evil, but by a contingency such as teenage jealousy.
According to Mira Boglić, such a denouement was the reason for the audience’s
lukewarm response to the film: Mitrović made “a cardinal and textbook mistake: in looking for
the culprits, he proved that there was no culprit to begin with... The viewer felt cheated and
betrayed [jednu kardinalnu i sasvim školsku grešku: tražeći krivca, dokazao je da krivca nije ni
bilo... Gledatelj se osjetio prevarenim i izigranim.] ” (1980, p. 39). Although the critic argued that
Mitrović realized his mistake and did not repeat it ever again, the filmmaker’s penchant for the
nuances of grey – which in Look for Vanda Kos resulted in the absolute lack of black – is evident
also in his most popular cycle: the famous “partisan westerns” set in the province of Kosovo in
the last days of the war and first days of peace, when the main Nazi forces were already defeated,
but partisans continued to fight the so-called ballists – i.e. the members of the Balli Kombëtar,
the Albanian nationalist and anti-communist resistance movement, which opposed both the
Italian occupiers and the communist guerrilla in Albania and Yugoslavia.60 I will focus on the
first three and most popular of these partisan westerns: Ešalon doktora M./Echelon of Doctor M.
(1955), Kapetan Leši/Captain Lleshi (1960), and Obračun/Showdown (1962); the last one – Brat
doktora Homera/The Brother of Doctor Homer (1968) necessarily remains outside this account,
although it also betrays the “Us vs. Them” dichotomy by having the main partisan commander as
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the chief villain.
The main protagonists of Echelon of Doctor M. are Ramadan and Hatixhe, husband and wife
who winded up on opposite sides in the war. Ramadan is a member of the ballist gang led by his
uncle Alija Kurtesi, a wealthy landlord (bey) who raised him as a son. Although he does not
really support the ballist cause, Ramadan had to join the gang in accordance to the patriarchal
filial norms, in an expression of the unconditional respect for his fatherly uncle as the master of
the family. However, even then Ramadan resists his uncle’s orders to kill someone and thus
irreversibly “smear his hands”. The other members of the gang are growing suspicious of
60
For a thorough historical account on the ballist movement, see Pearson (2005).
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Ramadan, recognizing him as a possible traitor. Alija defends the nephew by saying that had not
wanted the boy to become a soldier anyway but a lawyer – hence he paid for Ramadan’s law
studies before the war. Some members of the gang assume that the main reason behind
Ramadan’s estranged behaviour is his beautiful wife who has disgraced her husband’s family by
leaving them, taking off the veil, and, on top of everything, by becoming a partisan nurse.
However, what actually drives Ramadan is his abhorrence of the traditional ways: his
marriage with Hatixhe – imposed on them both – opened his eyes for the patriarchal
disempowerment of women and young men. In an act of deep anti-patriarchal solidarity,
Ramadan promises Hatixhe that he will not treat her in a traditional way, and will let her take off
the veil, to educate herself, and to work. As the war erupted and Alija ordered him to go the hills,
Ramadan feels that he betrayed his wife who remained trapped in the patriarchal household.
Hence, the news about Hatixhe leaving the Kurtesi house, and working unveiled in the partisan
hospital Ramadan does not perceive as a real treason. Growing weary of his patience, Alija
chastises the nephew for betraying his national and familial values, and eventually decides to
send him into combat. The opportunity arises when doctor M., who happens to be Hatixhe’s head
doctor, decides to evacuate the small-town hospital from by the wagon train – the titular echelon
– across the territory controlled by Alija’s gang (the plot device borrowed straight from John
Ford’s 1939 classic Stagecoach). Alija orders Ramadan and few other ballists to infiltrate the
echelon under cover, in order to attack the partisans guard. Ramadan thus meets Hatixhe, who
tries to talks him into betraying Alija’s orders, fearing that the attack will kill the wounded and
the sick. After witnessing the episode with the delirious patient who went amok, Ramadan
changes his mind and does not give the sign for the ballists to attack. Hatixhe invites the husband
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to leave the ballists and he eventually does that.
The main thrust of Captain Lleshi is the reconciliation of the two brothers who went the opposite
paths during the war: the older Ramiz became a partisan commander famous for his courage and
cunning tactics, whereas Ahmet joined the Nazis and became the right hand of Kosta, the local
ballist leader. Shortly before the end of the war, an unknown man in the tavern challenges
Ramiz’s impeccable status by reminding him that Ahmet’s squad still roams the surrounding
hills, escapes the partisan patrols, and kills the local peasants. Realizing that he will not be at
peace as long as Ahmet is among the outlaws, Ramiz meditates about the reasons that led his
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brother astray: “Should I accept that you became a criminal? [Zar da se pomirim s tim da si
postao zločinac?]”, he asks as he looks the pre-war photo of himself with the brother.
Interrogating one of the imprisoned Kosta’s men, Ramiz finds out that Ahmet “did not taint his
hands with blood [nije okrvavio ruke]”, and that Kosta keeps him close to himself because of
Ahmet’s family name, as the brothers belong to the wealthy and highly respected house. Ramiz
expressly rides to the hills to find Kosta’s guerrilla and to persuade them via Ahmet to surrender.
Kosta dismisses Ramiz’s offer, and when Ahmet and the peasants loyal to him decide to leave
the guerrilla, the two fractions clash. When Ahmet and his supporters arrive into town, Ramiz
contrives a scheme to get back to the hills and destroy Kosta’s squad. The media informs that
Ahmet has been sentenced to death and executed, whereas Ramiz, gravely disappointed by
decision of the officials, fled and went into hiding in the hills. The news reaches Kosta’s gang
and they accept Ramiz who pretends to be disillusioned with the communists and driven by
vengeance. A few plot twists later, Ramiz navigates Kosta’s squad into the partisan trap and
Ahmet kills Kosta.
The knot of the familial and ideological allegiances also shapes Showdown, the Captain Lleshi
sequel. The film opens in the courtroom, at the hearing about the 1945 attack of a ballist squad,
led by Šaban Murtezi (“the biggest bandit the right side of the river Drin [najveći bandit na
desnoj obali Drina]”), on a village guarded by the partisans. When Ramiz arrives to the village
to start investigation, Šaban organizes his assassination, which fails. The testimony of Mefail,
Šaban’s right-hand man, unearths that Šaban and Ramiz have a shared history dating back to
1941. Shortly after the Italian forces occupied Kosovo, Šaban attacked an Italian soldier and
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ended up in prison, from where he was rescued by Ramiz. They remained good friends as Šaban
also formed the guerrilla squad for the protection of the local population. Realizing the danger
coming from Šaban’s renegades, the Italians and the local riches made him a proverbial offer he
could not refuse: a pile of gold that was his only real ideology. Finding about the old friend’s
shift in allegiances, Ramiz found him and beat him up, causing the ever-lasting hate. The next
testimony comes from Kadrija; a member of Šaban’s squad and Mefail’s nephew, he is another
of Mitrović’s unwilling ballists. When his father died, the boy had to accept the estranged uncle
as the supreme authority in the family, and to follow him in joining the ballists. The bookish
type, Kadrija avoided fight, thus provoking Mefail’s rage and despise. After being bullied by the
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brutish uncle, Kadrija eventually leaves Šaban’s squad, joins Ramiz and in the final showdown
attacks Mefail and prevents him from running away. Ramiz, for his part, kills Šaban.
Although Captain Lleshi and Showdown also include romance, I decided not to include it
these synopses, as it is not as integral to the shift of the protagonists’ allegiances as it was in
Echelon of Doctor M. Whereas the passionate love between Hatixhe and Ramadan catalyzed his
split with the ballist gang and the acceptance of the possibilities offered by the socialist
modernity, no similar romantic attachment affects Ahmet’s and Kadrija’s decision to switch
sides, as the romance in both films is mostly reserved for Ramiz Lleshi. However, the romantic
formula of Captain Lleshi does offer one more character that challenges the “Good vs. Evil”
divide as unbridgeable. It is gorgeous Lola, the singer in the local tavern who is shaped after
many a luscious saloon siren; Ramiz has sex with her, unaware that she is the lover of Kosta,
who uses her charms to get the information on the military actions that could threaten the
ballists. Sinful and sexy Lola is designated in contrast to Ramiz’s another romantic partner, the
virtuous teacher Ana, an exemplary good girl. However, when Kosta scorns Lola for sleeping
with other men, she realizes that he does not appreciate her sacrifice for him, and has a change of
heart. By the end of the film, the bad girl Lola turns good and sides with Ramiz; Kosta kills her
in his last misdeed before he is caught.
Already relatively short account of Mitrović’s “Kosovo westerns”, such as this one, thus
unambiguously shows a number of gender-related motifs that abolish the “Us vs. Them”
dichotomy. Most of them are corralled around the troublesome legacy of the pre-war (and even
pre-modern) patriarchal filial system, the main values of which are embedded in securing the
“blood ties”, the family honour, and the class privileges. The films posit that some members of
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the ballist movement did not fight the partisans and socialist order due to some adamant
ideological beliefs, but simply because they decided to stick with the old patriarchal mores for
the reasons that had nothing to do with the politics in the standard meaning of the term. The
sense of loyalty for the supreme male authority in the family (local community) is the most
prevailing attitude that forces Mitrović’s reluctant ballists not to challenge the patriarch’s anticommunist allegiances. Ramadan, Ahmet and Kadrija are thus torn between their devotion to
(what they still see as) the acceptable values of the old order, and their own inner moral compass,
which warns them of the crimes that are being committed in the name of those values. The
redefinition of their masculinity is integral to their overall transformation, which ends in their
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acceptance of the new, socialist worldview and its respective gender order. Mitrović’s films thus
engage in the unambiguous criticism of the pre-socialist/pre-modern patriarchy as the gender
order that does not disenfranchise only women, but also many men.
And yet, this criticism is nevertheless at odds with one of the chief characteristics of
Mitrović’s Kosovo western: as many war, western and action films, they apparently glorify
macho image, embodied most paradigmatically in the character of Ramiz Lleshi, the paragon of
virility in war films of the classical Yugoslav cinema. In my view, the paradoxical incongruity
between the omnipotent partisan alpha-male figure and the general anti-patriarchal stance - antipatriarchal machoism, as it were – is effectively the key antagonism of Mitrović’s Kosovo cycle,
the aporia that cannot be fully resolved by choosing a definitive answer to the question is
Mitrović really pro or contra with regard to the radical transformation of the gender order, i.e. of
its patriarchal bias. A closer look at these three films reveals a far more complex and ever
changing picture. The first in the series, Echelon of Doctor M. introduces two types of
masculinity, embodied in the partisan doctor M. and Ramadan. However, both of these
masculinities are deeply flawed: for all his revolutionary and humanist credentials, M. is
alcoholic and apparently life-weary, melancholic, even tinged with the self-pity. Ramadan, for
his part, is significantly younger and physically superior to doctor M., yet still stifled with the
traditional patriarchal burden, which presses him to join the ballist movement. Positioned
between the two men, Hatixhe thus operates more as their mediator, the agent that will somehow
establish the constellation in which the both M. and Ramadan will fully reach their positive
potential and overcome their lacks. Captain Lleshi, however, gives up on the concept of
mediation, and introduces the flawless, sky-is-the-limit hero in the commander Ramiz, who
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combines the revolutionary virtues of doctor M. and the physical strength and stamina of
Ramadan.
However, what is the most crucial about this mix is the fact that there is nothing
inherently socialist or socialist realist about it – Mitorović developed it by drawing on the
western and action films from the West. Comparison with the rest of Yugoslav cinema is
particularly instructive: as we have seen, the image of partisan masculinity became de-sanctified,
more challenged and thwarted from the mid-1950s on – doctor M. perfectly illustrates that
process. By 1960, when Captain Lleshi was released, the celluloid images of male partisans, both
during the war and after, testify to a proverbial crisis of masculinity: the partisan men in the war
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are traumatized with their fallibilities (doubts, cowardice, etc.), whereas the partisan veterans in
the post-war period try to find their place in the society despite the physical and psychical
traumas.61 By creating Ramiz Lleshi – the triumphant alpha-male partisan – Mitrović thus did
not offer some radically new vision of the heroic anti-fascist struggle as authentic and true (it
was too obviously rooted in the Hollywood genres to create such an effect), but to offer a type of
brazen heroic, consecrated masculinity that almost became extinct from Yugoslav cinema. In any
way, it is telling that even such a hero did not exist in the “Us vs. Them” universe: his main aim
was to prove that not all of “them” are the same, irrecoverably bad and outright evil.
3.8.
Conclusion
The works analysed in this chapter do not exhaust the body of partisan/WWII films that
destabilize the “Us vs. Them” within the horizon of the classical narrative Yugoslav cinema. The
chapter could just as easily encompass some other examples: Njih dvojica/Two of Them (1955,
Žorž Skrigin), offers a benevolent četnik soldier who tries to help the main protagonist who hides
a wounded partisan in his cellar; in Pet minuta raja/Five Minutes of Paradise (1959, Igor
Pretnar), a benevolent Nazi soldier from Austria not only helps the couple of main protagonists
to escape from the clutches of the Nazis, but himself runs away with them; in the spy thriller X
25 javlja.../X 25 Reports (1960, František Čap), the communist sympathizer who operates as a
mole in the Nazi intelligence has a love affair with the German secretary, whose husband – a
Nazi officer – has been sentenced as the traitor of the Third Reich; the main partisan protagonist
of Mačak pod šljemom/The Cat with the Helmet (1962, Žorž Skrigin) befriends with a domobran,
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member of the Croatian Home Guard, who had previously shot at him in panic; etc. Also, the
shades of grey continued to colour the WWII/partisan films in the 1960s as well, most famously
in the works of the novi film auteurs. However, the same holds for the films that continued to rely
on the classical narrative and more conventional genre approach (combat films, thrillers etc.). If
we are to stick to Hajrudin Krvavac as the emblematic director of this ilk, it suffices to recall his
debut feature, omnibus Vrtlog/Whirl (1964, co-directed with Gojko Šipovac). Krvavac-helmed
segment “Ada”/“River Island” is set on the titular island in the middle of the river that separates
61
I have tackled the case of the film Alone in the introductory chapter; in Chapters 4 and 5 I will also point to
some examples of the troubled post-war masculity.
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the Partisans and the četnik forces. Unable to get to the partisan side, a fatally wounded young
partisan hides in the island woods, where he is found by his father, who is a četnik. The father
decides to save the son and take him away from the island, but the sight of their boat in the
midstream only triggers the fire from the both sides.
All these examples show that the historians and critics who accuse the WWII/partisans
films for the clear-cut “Us vs. Them” dichotomy are off the mark. This is not say that the conflict
between the partisans and the Nazis was not established as the conflict between the Good and the
Evil, but far from being a peculiar vision of WWII imposed by the Yugoslav communists it was
a globally hegemonic perspective of the war: simply, the Axis powers and their collaborators
were perceived as bad guys due to their unquestionably malign ideology and the crimes
committed on its behalf.
The fallacy of “the great divide” certainly could be criticized in more ways than one.
However, for the strategic reasons and in accordance to the feminist tenets of my study, I opted
to challenge it along the gender-related motifs and narratives. The first step in the analysis was to
acknowledge that the very “Us vs. Them” dichotomy – as articulated, for example, by
Musabegović – is implicitly gendered, or to be more precise, it implies the male bias: both “Us”
and “Them” are, essentially, the male warriors who confront other male combatants at gun point
in the endless battlefield clash. But the war is always more than a direct military confrontation; it
can never be reduced to a string of battles between the guys in two types of uniforms. Yugoslav
cinema has learnt that lesson relatively fast, under the attack of the Yugoslav film critics who
accused it too many times for the crass black and white divide, but also, inevitably, under the
influences from other national cinemas. The filmmakers relied on the various types of
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femininities and masculinities to outline specific ideological positions, but also to challenge
them. A closer look on these gender motifs reveals the extent to which the developments of the
classical Yugoslav cinema were dynamic. Even the socialist realist films, which are by all means
the most notorious among the critics, featured some significant shifts in that regard, the most
remarkable being the rapid de-stigmatization of the bad – i.e. the bourgeois, glamorous,
collaborationist – woman. The films often brought into proximity ideological others by
downplaying their masculine aggressiveness, or accentuating their feminine virtues. The
entangled filial and familial networks, just as unpredictable romantic affairs, also complicated
the seemingly simple dichotomy. The allegedly monolith “our guys” dispersed into a myriad of
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subjects, shaped by their respective gender roles, class, age, location, and the psychological
traits.
The temptation to capture many of these complexities resulted in what can be seen as the
chief shortcoming of this chapter. In comparison with the following two chapters, this chapter
tackles more films at the expense of often remaining on the level of the elemental plot, without
undertaking a more detailed analysis of some stylistic traits or engaging in tangential
comparisons with other films, which do not belong to this genre strictly. This move is my
strategic decision: whereas the two chapters that follow deal with the films that are usually
unnoticed by the advocates of the totalitarian model, the pile of fallacies and misconceptions
about the partisan/WWII films is getting larger. This prompted me to demonstrate that: (1) one
does not have to probe deep in those films to see that they actually defy those fallacies, and (2)
that there is a significantly larger number of these films which complicates the “Us vs. Them”
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divide than their detractors are willing to admit.
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Chapter 4
How the love was tempered: Labour, romance,
and gender asymmetry in the construction cycle, 1948–1958
Given the importance that Marxist theory and socialist ideology assigned to work, it is not
surprising that Yugoslav cinema boasted many representations of labour and labour force. Most
prominently, the labour imagery suffused a number of documentaries that glorified the work
along the lines of Béla Balázs’ panegyric to “Epics of Labour” from his famous Filmkúltura: “If
there are films which deserve the appellation of ‘cultural’ films, they are those film memorials to
human effort, proclaiming the glory of human labour, toil which at the cost of skill and sweat is
labouring to make this earth a garden” (1952, p. 166). Indeed, by rendering virtually all types of
labour and segments of the workforce, the documentaries remain the privileged imaginary of the
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development of the Yugoslav socialist modernity.
In this chapter, however, I analyze the knot of labour and gender in the feature films,
following a rather straightforward assumption that we can deem our working hypothesis: as the
Yugoslav communists credited work as a privileged means of emancipation (including the
gender emancipation as well), one could expect that the celluloid workers of early Yugoslav
socialism would designate the standard – if not ultimate – embodiments of the “new socialist
men and women”. I will test this hypothesis by analyzing what I label as the “construction cycle”:
a group of feature films produced from 1948 to 1958 which screened the “renewal and
construction [obnova i izgradnja]” of the country obliterated by World War II, and the parallel
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rapid industrial development that the communists deemed fundamental for the rise of the
Yugoslav economy. In the first part of the chapter, I deal with specific construction films,
whereas in the second, I historicize them in light of the shifts in Yugoslav socio-economic and
gender order from the late 1940s to the early 1960s.
4.1.
The early classical period (1948–1950)
The films that I am going to tackle in this subchapter – Život je naš – Ljudi s pruge/The Life is Ours –
The People from the Railway (1948, Gustav Gavrin), Priča o fabrici/Story of a Factory (1949,
Vladimir Pogačić), Jezero/Lake (1950, Radivoje Lola Djukić) and Plavi 9/Blue 9 (1950, Krešo
Golik) – belong to early classical Yugoslav cinema, with its constellation of the “ideologicallyenlightening populism”, the cinematic primitivism, and the revolutionary asceticism.
Let me approach the gender politics of this group of films using the comparative
perspective between Yugoslav and other Eastern European cinemas. In doing so, I rely on Petra
Hanáková’s remarkable essay about images of women in Czech cinema, which establishes that
“out of the almost 30 films made in the socialist realist style between 1949 and 1955, nearly one
fourth focuses on women or [women’s] emancipation as their central theme” (2011, p. 149).
Hanáková recaps the synopses of six of these films in which the women, as the central
protagonists – engineers, bricklayers, tractor drivers etc. – embody the shift from the old, pre-
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socialist ways to the new, revolutionary ones:
The exemplary figure of this polarity is the young single woman who, like the proverbial jackfish,
forces the potbellied and slow-swimming carps in the pond to move. She understands the
greatness of the new tasks and undertakes them with joy, as they form part of a broader project of
the socialist future. [...] All the aforementioned socialist realist films picture women successfully
entering the workplace, becoming politically active and winning the heart of a man who shares
their modern attitude to life, thus also revolutionizing their domestic division of roles.
(2011, p. 151)
Following Hanáková, one would expect that this type of worker heroine was anything but rare in
cinemas of the socialist Eastern Europe where the cult of work had a prominent socio-ideological
role. As the working hypothesis posits, the Yugoslav cinema should have abounded with the
images of the women workers contemporaneous to those described by Hanáková. And yet,
although Yugoslavia also nurtured “the cult of work” in the late 1940s and thus boasted its share
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of the “heroines of work” (Anić, 2013; Matošević, 2013), not a single Yugoslav feature film has
a central female protagonist who would fit the character – or, rather, given its socialist-realist
credentials, the typage – described by Hanáková.
Surprising as it might appear, this difference becomes more understandable in light of
two factors. First, with no significant pre-war tradition, the classical Yugoslav cinema was a
pioneer one and thus generally thin in its output: e.g., the first ten years of the feature film
production (1947–1956) saw a modest sixty-four works, fourteen of them being set in the
socialist present, and only five tackling the post-war renewal and construction. Second, due to
the Soviet–Yugoslav rift in 1948, socialist realism in Yugoslav cinema started to vanish even
before it fully developed as it did in other Eastern European cinema. Thus, one could argue that
the meager amount of films that celebrate the emancipation through work was symptomatic of
the short-lived and volatile presence of socialist realism in the classical Yugoslav cinema.
However, as some classical Yugoslav films did tackle the woman’s relation to labour in
the early socialist modernity, it is worth to explore in what ways exactly these representations
differ from Hanáková’s examples. The guiding thread in the analysis will be the relation that
these films establish between work and romance. Hanáková argues that in the socialist-realist
films, labour has an upper hand over
love. For the heroines of work, their
professional/ideological commitment is the precondition for successful romantic life: “happiness
comes through labour, and love can exist only as a part of the satisfaction in the collective work”
(Hanáková, 2011, p.152). A strong streak of romantic melodrama in the Yugoslav construction
films invites us to scrutinize their rendition of the labour-over-love hierarchy: if the socialist
realism ingrained it in Yugoslav cinema, how long did it stay there given the diminishing of the
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style, and what were its vicissitudes?
4.2.1. The Life is Ours
The fourth Yugoslav feature, and the very first one set in the post-war period, The Life is Ours
tells the story of one of the many “youth labour brigades” that were the major work force in
building of the industrial infrastructure (railroads, hydroelectric dams, factories, etc.) in the late
1940s and throughout the 1950s. In a small pool of the Yugoslav film pioneers, Gustav Gavrin
was something of a natural choice for a feature on this topic, as he had directed Brčko–Banovići
(1947), a documentary about the construction of the titular railroad. In the promptly translated
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Yugoslav edition of his Filmkúltura, Béla Balázs deemed this very film as revolutionary as it
depicted something genuinely new:
For, we have never seen people smiling under such circumstances [...]. Seeing those youthful
smiles, we are becoming eyewitnesses of the first manifestations of the new human spirit. [...] A
historical – hence all-human – significance of the construction of the Yugoslav railroad can be
seen in those smiles. The camera has discovered new people of a new epoch.
Jer još nikada nismo videli da se ljudi, pod ovakvim okolnostima, [...] osmehuju. Postajemo
očevidci prvih manifestacija novog ljudskog duha, videvši te mladalačke osmehe. [...] U tim
osmesima je koncentrisan sav istoriski – jer je sveljudski – značaj izgradnje jugoslovenske
železnice. Kamera je otkrila nove ljude jedne nove epohe.
(1948, 162–163, original emphasis)62
Gavrin’s feature debut also abounds with these smiling new people – a predominantly male
youth brigade – who dig a tunnel against all odds (the lack of training and experience, the
outdated equipment, the underground torrents etc.). Eventually, the boys triumph over the
elements and their own insecurities, since, as Balázs had it, “the railroad became [their] alma
mater [Pruga je postala [njihova] alma mater]” (1948, p. 162).
Integral to the boys’ emotional growth are the first romantic experiences. Coming after
the three WWII-set films that featured romances with tragic endings, The Life is Ours was the
very first film with a romantic happy ending, which, it goes without saying, should stand for the
overall social harmony in the wake of socialist modernity. However, the film’s romantic layers
are as underdeveloped as they are symptomatic. There are two chief reasons for that. First,
Gavrin might have made the documentary praised by a critic like Balázs, but his debut feature
failed to deliver, to say the least. Second, the filmmakers tried to come to terms with the
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“revolutionary asceticism”; and, in my view, they realized the elusive and ambiguous nature of
its “cruel morality”, and thus came up with the two neatly separated and tellingly different love
stories.
The first romance involves two episodic characters: nurse Mara and student Slobodan. In
the ultimate example of the film’s containment of romance, their love is suggested by a single
scene, which pops up thirty-seven minutes into the film, out of absolutely nowhere: not a single
previous shot has shown that the two knew about each other, let alone shared any feelings. The
very same scene, however, promptly turns into the end of what has never even become a full62
It seems that Balázs wrote the segment “Historical smile” specifically for the Yugoslav edition of Filmkúltura
(1948, pp. 162–163), as it cannot be found in the English version (1952).
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fledged romance: as the Trieste crisis escalates, Mara decides to leave the railroad, arguing that
her nursing skills will be more needed in a possible military conflict.63
FIGURE 4.1–2 Mara and Slobodan in The Life is Ours
Mara and Slobodan never utter the word “love”, and yet the mise-en-scène unambiguously
invites an amorous attachment between them. As the two wander off to the construction site and
walk along the river, they are framed from the lower angle, surrounded with plants and showing
the sky in the background (FIGURE 4.1–2). However, the mise-en-scène also includes one more
important element: the presence of the labour collective. As Mara and Slobodan walk, they can
see groups of young brigadiers running by them, singing and feasting nearby. At first, it seems
that the overbearing presence and the zeal of the revolutionary collective thwarts the more
immediate expression of love between the two. However, things are a bit more ambiguous, as the
revolutionary, collective pathos is what makes their love possible in the first place. In other
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words, the labour collective that surrounds Mara and Slobodan gives body to the big Other of the
socialist-realism, which, if we are to judge from this particular love story, privileges labour and
construction – “the work hedonism”, as Ranković would have it – over love and desire.
Watching the labour brigade that triumphantly sings while marching with flags over the newly
constructed bridge, Slobodan solemnly declares: “How rich is our life! [Kako je naš život
bogat!]”, to what Mara adds in the same tone: “The life is ours! [Život je naš!]” They exchange a
brief look, in what appears to be the standard substitute for the passionate kiss in those days of
63
On Trieste crises, see Sluga (1994).
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sexual asceticism. Their unrealized romance thus stands for the socialist-realist formula of the
work/ideological commitment outranking the romance.
Although the second romance does not start before the fifty minutes mark, it gets more
screen time and a gradual development, thus appearing as the romance proper (to be sure, again
no one utters the L-word). Its protagonists are the young peasants Milan and Stana. The
difference between them and the previous couple is striking. Whereas Slobodan was a more of an
urban intellectual, who pitied himself for not being strong like the other brigadiers (most of them
peasants), Milan is the most hardworking brigadier, whose commitment and stamina earn him a
leading position in the labour unit. The difference between Mara and Stana is even more
prominent. Devoting herself to the new revolutionary task, Mara leaves the man whom she
ostensibly loves, while Stana gets defined primarily in terms of her love for Milan.
FIGURE 4.3–4 Milan and Stana in The Life is Ours
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The consequences of the shift between the two couples are blatantly visible in the double finale
of the film. The first finale suggests that the unspoken love between Milan and Stana will survive
the end of the works at the tunnel site. Milan asks Stana what she will do after the railroad gets
completed; she gently touches the dirty soiled sleeve of his work jacket, trying to remove the
dirt, in what is the very first and the last physical contact between the two. Then she raises her
head and, while looking Milan straight in the eyes, responds: “To another [labour action]! [Na
drugu!]” Enthused by her response, the boy smiles: “That means together! [Znači zajedno!]”, to
what Stana approvingly nods (FIGURE 4.3–4).
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In the following finale, the brigadiers and the people from the neighboring villages gather
in a mass eruption of joy after the completion of the tunnel. At the peak of a spectacular
celebration, the final shots show Milan with two of his closest colleagues, as they triumphantly
march, sing, and look at the spectators in a fairly common socialist-realist breaking of the fourth
wall (FIGURE 4.5–6). Stana, however, is excluded from this spectacle altogether. Although we
see her for a moment in the sequence preceding the final feast, she is nowhere to be seen in the
last shots.
FIGURE 4.5–6 The triumphant camaraderie in the ending of The Life is Ours
The difference between the two finales, then, reveals an important gender asymmetry. The first
finale mixes romance and labour, whereas the second decouples them. The former reveals that
Stana relates to labour through her love for Milan, as her future work on another construction site
is a thinly veiled metonymy for her devotion to the boy. Although the first finale suggests that
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the same holds for Milan too, Stana’s absence from the second finale suggests that her love is
hardly integral to his relation to work. Instead, what really counts is the unconditional bond he
has with his work buddies, incarnated in the male camaraderie. Here, however, we should not
miss a crucial detail: the first ending, which detours Stana’s relation to work through her love for
Milan, is a romantic happy ending. Its chief function is to confirm that a woman will stand by her
man; once she does that, the film takes her for granted and excludes her from the picture of the
man as the triumphant labourer.
From a feminist perspective, such a flamboyant display of male privilege over work
cannot but appear as a disappointing coda to the film that, despite being centered on the male
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brigadiers, managed to carve out some space for the women’s emancipation. For example, being
set in the backward Bosnian countryside, where the Muslim women were traditionally veiled, the
film tackles, tangentially at least, the issue of unveiling in accordance with the socialist
principles of gender equality. The local Muslim girls, like Mara’s and Stana’s friend Fadila, take
off the traditional dress and veils that completely covered their faces, and join the workforce.
The Life is Ours, thus, performs two interrelated moves. First, it replaces the committed,
assertive socialist femininity that does not define itself primarily via the romantic relation to the
man (Mara), with the one that tacitly complies with the male privilege (Stana). Second is the
move from the solemn ending of the first romance to the happy ending as a preferable closure of
the socialist-set love story. This can be seen as a bitterly ironic twist on Hanáková’s remark that
the socialist realism “limit the woman to her public, political function in the service of the
socialist state, creating the image of a woman as a token of the socialist struggle, with her
personality limited to a vehicle of narrative and political purpose” (2011, p. 153). If anything,
The Life is Ours shows that socialist realism can also easily create a problematic image of
women precisely by doing the opposite: by subjugating the political motivation to the romantic
imperative.
4.2.2. Story of a Factory
Coming after an aesthetical disappointment that was The Life is Ours, Story of a Factory was
acknowledged as the first veritable representation of the Yugoslav post-war reality. Daniel J.
Goulding specified both the shortcomings and the virtues of the film: although it “shares the
idealism and patriotism which characterized these early films of socialist reconstruction and
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reveals some of the same simple stereotyping of heroic workers and irredeemable reactionary
types”, the film nevertheless “provided a more interesting and complex sense of time and setting,
a more believable and natural style of film acting, and more sophistication in character
development” (2002, p. 24). This analysis, however, will stress how Story of a Factory treated
gender, labour, and romance rather differently than The Life is Ours did.
The film is set in a textile factory in Zagreb, which is plagued by many problems that are
posited as specific for the late 1940s. On one hand, the outdated technology, inadequate working
conditions and the lack of coordination with the suppliers makes the production much harder,
whereas, on the other hand, the pre-war owner of the factory plots a sabotage that would blow
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the place up in smithereens. Accordingly, the two plots shape the film, each having a respective
chief protagonist. The main protagonist of the sabotage plot is Branimir, a seasoned engineer
who already worked in the factory before the war; hence, the pre-war owner Gartner pressures
him to sabotage the factory. The principal protagonist of the production plot is Marija, a textile
worker who tries to compensate the troubles at the workplace by increased labour: she
demonstrates that one labourer could double her output by simultaneously working on six
machines instead on only three. The plots substantially intersect in the film’s climax, when
Marija’s experimental demonstration is abruptly ended by the explosion that destroys the facility.
Both plots involve misfortunate matrimonies. Branimir’s wife Ksenija is constantly
nagging about their family’s fall from pre-socialist socioeconomic grace. Whereas her husband
has come to terms with the socio-political change, realizing that he can pursue his profession in
socialism as well, Ksenija persists in her status of a victim whom the socialist regime robbed of
her high-class status. A bourgeois decadence incarnated, she is a glamorous beauty who indulges
in all sorts of things that are inappropriate for – and inaccessible to – the working-class women
like Marija. She idles around her vast habitat all day long, smoking, drinking, wearing kimonostyle robes, issuing orders to her housemaid and pestering her husband lady Macbeth style. She
insists that her husband sides with Gartner in a plot to destroy the facility.
Marija’s matrimony is unhappy for altogether different reasons. Her husband Ferdo
accuses her of privileging her profession over their marriage, and does not even try to grasp her
motivation for her zealous professional commitment. In his retelling of the film, Goulding sees
Ferdo’s complaints as “the only note of protest” against “the growing sense of solidarity between
the workers” in the factory, and claims that the husband “sees little to recommend such huge
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exertions [on Marija’s side] in the face of low pay, minimal living conditions, and shortages of
the basic necessities of life” (2002, p. 25). However, both points miss the mark. Ferdo, himself
an impeccable worker, neither shuns the workers’ solidarity, nor reproaches Marija for working
too much with no adequate compensation. What really bothers him is Marija’s refusal to separate
the public (her vocation) from the private life (their marriage). Marija’s excessive dedication to
work, according to Ferdo, prevents her to develop a specific notion of privacy, domesticity, and
family.
Once both marriages end on a sour note, the main protagonists completely give up on
romance and turn to their work. In the final scene, Marija, Branimir and their manager Kosta are
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glowing in a vast, bright working hall, among the new machines. Previously depicted as
chronically worn out and worried, now, Marija looks younger, reinvigorated, with a new hair
style and clothes, and with no trace of fatigue or sadness in her wide smile. In what could be seen
as a counter-image to the male camaraderie in the last shots of The Life is Ours, the two men and
the woman labourer turn their back to the camera and walk away together.
A Greimas square can help us to delineate the positions of the four spouses in relation to
their historical-ideological context:
Marija’s central feature is her firm refusal of the public/private divide. In contrast to her
husband, Marija argues that the public and the private, factory and family, cannot be separated.
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This is no surprise given that her closest co-worker in the pre-war days was her own sister, who
has been killed by the quisling regime. What appears to be merely Marija’s too excessive attempt
to the production rate turns out to be a painstaking strategy of keeping the intimate memory of
her sister alive – something that Ferdo fails to acknowledge. Marija’s testimony at the Gartner
trial also illustrates her view on the public and the private. While describing the events in the
factory before the sabotage, she starts talking about her own domestic situation. When the
defense lawyer objects that her private life is irrelevant for the case, Marija is aghast: “‘Private
life’?! Do you really think that life can be divided? [‘Privatni život’!? Zar vi zbilja mislite da se
život može dijeliti?]”
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Story of a Factory thus dismisses the notion that anyone should surrender her or his
emancipation-through-work status to the imperatives of marriage. That makes the film an
exception among the early Yugoslav films, which prefer to render the marriage as the paramount
stage for romance. Ferdo’s pressure on Marija shows that the marriage, even in socialism, can be
all too easily compromised by the patriarchal values and imperatives. Not only that the film
designates a committed socialist man, who narcissistically believes that he should be the main
object of his wife’s love and care, but, far more importantly, it underscores that it is primarily
men who continue to define the border between the private and the public, something to which
all women should comply. In other words, the private/public divide continues to court the
patriarchal privilege in the socialist modernity as well.
This makes Story of a Factory a far more complex film than it initially appears. There is
no doubt that most of what Marija says in the film operates as not very subtle socialist-realist
propaganda on the importance of work. And yet, when reading her statements, we should not
reduce them to their content alone, but should also take into account the position from which
they are uttered. It is a position of a woman caught in the marital peril: the husband shoehorns
her in the image and a role that she adamantly does not want to accept as her own. A look back at
Hanáková’s account is instructive again, for she notices that the Czech socialist-realist heroines
would eventually find “similarly progressive partners” and win “the heart of a man who shares
their modern attitude to life, thus also revolutionizing their domestic division of roles”. In the
case of Marija, however, integral to her heroism is her ability to cut her ties with the problematic
husband who, despite his respectable professional status and ideological commitment,
nevertheless, remains anything but progressive and modern in terms of the socialist politics of
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gender equality. Hence, despite the unquestionable socialist realist credentials of Story of a
Factory, its profound skepticism towards the marital privilege torpedoes the socialist pursuit of
romantic happiness.
4.2.3. Lake and Blue 9
The two socialist-realist construction films from 1950 dispersed the cautionary air of Story of a
Factory. Lake and Blue 9 both foregrounded the male privilege and creation of love couple as the
ultimate index of social harmony, furthering the formula of the socialist realist melodrama.
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Lake is set at the construction site of a huge hydroelectric plant, and in the nearby village that
should be resettled, as it occupies the location of the prospective accumulation lake. Mato, a
young and handsome teacher who presides over the local co-operative, convinces the peasants
that there are benefits of the building of the dam and the resettlement: the hydroelectric plant
would provide electricity, whereas the village should be resettled in the water-safe zone, with an
even more fertile soil. His most vocal opponent is Petar, an old peasant who is driven by
stubbornness and disbelief in modernity, whereas the real antagonists are the pre-war kulak and a
priest who orchestrate the sabotage at the dam. Petar’s daughter Mara, unlike her father,
devotedly supports the changes. By the end of the film, she and Mato will unite in a romantic
couple, this bliss will signify the end of the ordeals: as the electricity lights up the flash bulbs in
the new village, Mato and Mara sneak away from the main feast to the lake shore and kiss.
After Story of a Factory decidedly refused to define the socialist femininity in terms of
the male privilege, Lake vehemently brings back and amplifies the gender asymmetry. First, it
reintroduces the figure of the woman whose professional interests are shaped by the means of the
romantic attachment to the man’s. At the same time, the man is resistant to the romantic troubles,
as they do not cloud his mind nor detract him from work: when Mara temporarily turns to Jerko
that does not challenge or affect Mato’s ideological and professional priorities. The same cannot
be said about Mara. Her status is always substantially defined by means of her relation to a man,
whether it be Jerko, or Mato. Also, we should not miss the class aspect of the affair: by
introducing the romance between a middle-class man and a peasant girl, Lake testifies that the
traditional patriarchal romance is not merely an effect of the lower class background and the lack
of knowledge, as one could conclude from the case of the peasant couple in The Life is Ours.
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The importance of Lake, for this analysis, lies in introducing a specific romantic plot. At
its beginning, the male protagonist – the positive socialist hero – is coupled with a woman who
does not share his idealism and allegiance to the communist cause. The discrepancy between the
two intensifies when he moves to some backward region in order to help in its modernization;
the woman, however, snubs the idea to leave the big city for the backwater that her man bravely
tries to change for the better. The couple breaks up, the woman returns to the big city, whereas
the man finds a new match, this time, the appropriate one: the local beauty who was secretly in
love with him the entire time, and who consequently develops an ideological attachment to
communism.
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Lake starts at the provincial train station as Mato sees his girlfriend off back to Sarajevo
where she lives and works as a teacher. The girl reproaches Mato for leaving their big city for the
province where she cannot possibly stay: “Such a filthy place, the mud... [Tako prljavo mjesto,
blato...]” She will appear in the film only one more time, providing Mato with the pretext to
expressly announce the end of their relationship: “We are not meant for one another. I almost
lost the girl who truly loves me because of you! [Nismo mi jedno za drugo. Zamalo da zbog tebe
nisam žrtvovao djevojku koja me zaista voli!]” That other girl is, of course, Mara, who at that
very moment spots the couple from a far, and wrongly concludes that Mato will remain devoted
to his city girl. Thus she turns to Jerko, the local young man whom she does not love, yet, who
repeatedly expresses his love for her and proposes to her. The prospect of a marriage with Jerko
is untenable, not only because Mara does not really love him, but also because he is one of the
villains.
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FIGURE 4.7–8 The obliquely rendered kiss in the last shots of Lake
Let me wrap up the discussion on Lake by tackling its final shot that screened the first socialistset happy-end kiss in Yugoslav cinema, although obliquely: we see the lovers’ silhouettes in
medium long shot as they embrace and kiss against the lucid background of the titular lake
(FIGURE 4.7–8). Thus, the kiss is not completely visible, but is certainly “there”, on-screen, with
its tremendous importance, as we are talking about an era when, as Linda Williams summed it,
the film kisses “carr[ied] the burden—or the enormous electrical charge—of being the whole of
sex that can be seen” (2008, p. 26) in cinema. The lovers are monitored by a person who can be
seen as an embodiment of the big Other: it is Petar, Mara’s nosey and jealous father, who
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watches the couple from afar and is not happy with what he sees; however, he returns to the
house without interfering and the lovers remain undisturbed in their bliss. We understand Petar’s
behavior – first following the lovers but eventually retracting – in light of the emancipation of
the women and young men from the traditional patriarchal norms, here much more prominent a
theme than in The Life is Ours. The stern father is both a ridiculous anachronism, which is
defused by the revolutionary change, but also a warning that in the new socialist society the
patriarchal customs will not disappear overnight.
The protagonist of Blue 9 is Zdravko, a young and hardworking underwater welder in the
shipyard “The Shock-Worker [Udarnik]”, who also happens to be the best player of the factory’s
soccer club. “Blue 9” refers to the team number he gets after being transferred to the A-league
soccer club Dinamo. He is in love with Nena, a student apprentice in the shipyard and an
exemplary athlete herself; she is a record-holding member of the local swimming club. At one
point, the two of them plan to go to the movies. “Are you sure that there is no shooting in it?
[Jeste li sigurni da nema pucanja u njemu?] ”, asks Nena, as they inspect the film’s poster. “Does it
have to have a happy ending? [A mora li biti sretan završetak?]”, Zdravko snaps back, smiling.
“Of course it does! [Svakako!]”, she says cheerfully, as Golik’s light-hearted comedy winks at
the spectators, commenting about its own “happily ever after” priorities.
The prospect of romance is seemingly shadowed by Fabris, a spoiled and self-centered
Dinamo star who attempts to prevent Zdravko’s arrival in Dinamo, justly seeing him as his major
rival, and entices Nena’s vanity and thirst for fame. However, this antagonist turns to be a paper
tiger, as the most pressing conflict in the film has nothing to do with him per se, but has
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everything to do with the ways in which Nena and Zdravko relate to work and sports.
In the penultimate moment, Zdravko faces the elemental choice: whether to play for
Dinamo in an international match, or, participate in an important working task? An exemplary
positive hero of the socialist realism, he expressly chooses labour over sports. The reward for
such model behavior comes instantly: once Zdravko makes his decision, everybody from his
manager to the Dinamo officials give their best to enable him to have it both ways. Hence, after
completing his hard underwater work, Zdravko jumps out of his heavy atmospheric dive suit and
gets transported to the stadium where he brings victory to Dinamo. Apparently, once you
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embrace your profession as the only real choice, the rest – the passion for and success in sports –
follows, as if by magic.
However, when Nena confronts the same dilemma, she cannot set the priorities straight.
Her flights of fancy about becoming a sport star make her neglect the educational work in the
factory; when her fellow students and team-mates warn her that her sport activity should not
cloud her education, she dismisses the criticism. In the last wake-up call for Nena, the athletic
council bans her from participating in a major swimming competition, to what she reacts with
rage and defiance, considering giving up on the study and the future in the factory altogether.
However, what makes Nena eventually choose work over sports is her passionate attachment to
Zdravko. The moment she finds out that, in the same dilemma, he opted differently from her, she
grasps the aptness and nobility of his choice, and changes her mind. Predictably, at that same
moment, her problem magically disappears: not only is she expressly allowed to participate in
the swimming tournament, but her triumph anticipates Zdravko’s victory at the soccer field.
The male privilege, thus, wins the day again. Similar to Mato, Zdravko remains solid in
the face of the romantic ordeal: in the moment of the dilemma, he believes that Nena does not
love him and is angry at her, and yet, that does not prevent him from making the right decision.
For a man, the profession has an upper hand over love, and, apparently, cannot be substantially
affected by it. For a woman, things are vice versa, the right romantic choice is the precondition
for making a proper professional decision. Left to her own devices, undirected by love and the
man’s guidance, she ends up in hysteria and bad decisions.
However, paradoxically, the romantic privilege properly challenges the socialist realist
credentials of the film in what is the film’s central contradiction. Nena resists all direct,
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politically-aware lessons from her peers: the collective influence on her fails utterly, only
igniting her anger and defiance. Only her love for Zdravko will make her change her mind and
adopt the advices her colleagues give her. In opposition to Hanáková’s thesis that in the socialist
realism “love can exist only as a part of the satisfaction in the collective work” (2011, p. 152),
love in Blue 9 is the key precondition for acknowledging the importance of the professional and
the collective – again, for women only.
The finale of Blue 9 is reluctant to crown the happy ending with a kiss – or, to be precise:
the kiss on screen. Just as Nena and Zdravko are about to seal the film with a pucker, they are
interrupted by Zdravko’s buddy Pjero, who provided comic relief for most of the film and does
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the same again. The final shot, thus, zooms on Pjero’s face, as he realizes that he popped up in a
bad moment and, ashamed, covers his face with a cap (FIGURE 4.9–12).
FIGURE 4.9–12 The failed kiss, and Pjero’s shame in the ending of Blue 9
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Pjero’s reaction, at its most general, can be seen as an index of the persistent ambivalence of the
big Other of early socialist modernity with regard to romance. However, in a telling difference
from the jealous and angry patriarch Petar in the finale of Lake, Pjero reacts with shame. This
feeling received a relatively small amount of attention by the psychoanalyst theory; JacquesAlain Miller (2006) reminds us of such two places in the work of Jacques Lacan. First, in
Seminar XI, Lacan recounts Sartre’s anecdote about a subject who peeps through a keyhole,
hears someone’s steps on the stairs, and that triggers a feeling of shame. This feeling strike the
subject before he even finds out the identity of the person on the stairs, i.e. what shames the
subject is the “anonymous gaze” that turns him from the subject (who looks) into an object
(which is looked at): “This is where shame is introduced: ‘I recognize that I am this object that
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the Other regards and judges’” (Miller, 2006, p. 14). Lacan returns to shame in Seminar XVII,
which he held in 1970, as his commentary of the student protests of 1968 and the historical
moment that triggered them. According to Lacan, the shift from the “puritan” capitalism toward
the “permissive” one in the late 1960s/early 1970 entailed the loss of shame. The permissive
capitalism – nowadays also known as “the late capitalism” – does not prohibit the subject’s
access to the enjoyment (jouissance), but buttresses it and even imposes it as the imperative.
Hence, in the era in which one is ordered to enjoy at any cost, the ashamed subject, as the one
described by Sartre, becomes a rarity, structurally anomalous, if not impossible. Lacan thus ends
the seminar by pleading for shame: he tells his audience that he wants to make them ashamed
“not too much, but just enough” (2007, p. 193).
Although, to notice the obvious, the films that I interpret are not made in capitalism, I
believe that their images of shame (or the lack of) attests to a dynamical interplay of prohibition
and permissiveness that can be traced in the history of socialist modernity as well. In that sense,
the absence of Zdravko and Nena kissing, and the display of Pjero’s shame signify that the
universe of Blue 9 is still one in which the revolutionary asceticism requires an air of prohibition
in the depiction of the socialist present.
We find the perfect point of comparison in the first Yugoslav films set in the past
(historical or mythical), which featured a more relaxed representation of sex-and-violence in the
classical Yugoslav cinema. Hence, the very same year when Lake and Blue 9 were still restrained
in sealing their socialist romances with a kiss, the adaptation of a folklore legend Čudotvorni
mač/The Miraculous Sword boasted a fleeting, but visible pucker (FIGURE 4.13–14), which was
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soon to become a standard affair in Yugoslav cinema.64
64
I will elaborate more on this permissiveness of the historical films in the next chapter.
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FIGURE 4.13–14 The happily-ever-after kiss in Miraculous Sword
4.2.
The mature classical period (1957–1958)
After Lake and Blue 9, the construction films disappear for seven years. By the time they
returned, Yugoslav cinema transformed from the state-owned one to the cinema of the producers;
among other changes, the status of socialist realism, as Raymond Williams’ would have it,
shifted from the hegemonic to the residual by the mid 1950s. However, from 1951 to 1956 the
filmmakers did not produce many socialism-set films, as if it was more convenient for them to
designate the horror and the glory of WWII, and the depravities of the pre-socialist era, than to
more fully render the socialist present. Hence, the period saw only eight socialism-set films,
which were outsized by nineteen films set in WWII and twenty-one films set in some earlier
historical epochs.
In 1957, however, the tables have finally turned, the nine “contemporary themed” films
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wining over two WWII-set and three historical ones – this dominance of the socialism-set films
over two other groups will remain uncontested by the very end of Yugoslav cinema. Within that
batch, the construction-set film also resurfaced. Out of the five of them released in 1957 and
1958, four were romantic melodramas with a happy ending: Nije bilo uzalud/It Was Not in Vain
(1957, Nikola Tanhofer), Zenica (1957, Jovan Živanović and Miloš Stefanović), Te noći/On That
Night (1958), and Samo ljudi/Only Human (1958, Branko Bauer). Moreover, as we shall soon
see, even the fifth one was anything but sad: Pogon B/Section B (1958, Vojislav Nanović) was a
comedy that promoted another type of relation at the expense of the heterosexual romance. The
predominance of the romantic happy ending was not surprising, as it reigned the rest of Yugoslav
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socialist-set films as well: U oluji/In the Tempest (1952, Vatroslav Mimica), Svi na more/Off to
the Seaside (1952, Sava Popović), Vesna (1953, František Čap), Ne čakaj na maj/Don’t Whisper
(1957, František Čap), Male stvari/The Little Things (1957, Boško Kosanović), and the two
romantic stories in the omnibus Subotom uveče/Saturday Night (1957, Vladimir Pogačić). It
seemed that the era of tragic love has finished with WWII: it transpires that romance in socialism
had to be a happily-ever-after affair.
4.2.1. It Was Not in Vain and Zenica
Not set at a construction site in a literal sense, It Was Not in Vain varies the early-socialistmodernity plot by being set in a marsh-encircled village that, plagued by malaria and
superstition, begs for modernization. The main protagonist is Jura, an exemplary agent of
modern knowledge, rationality, and action. Born in the countryside, yet, left for the big city to
study medicine, he returns to his village as the young doctor driven by desire to eradicate its
backward ways.
The very conflict between the pre-socialist and the socialist is tellingly gendered. The
principal antagonist of the enthusiastic, young male doctor is Čarka, an old woman who lives in
the swamp and is reputedly a witch. Embodying the pre-modern ignorance at its most heinous,
she warns the illiterate peasants that her spells are superior to vaccination, chemicals, and other
humbugs of the modern medicine. Threatened by Čarka’s curses, the peasants avoid vaccination
from malaria, which makes the old woman responsible for their deaths. However, later, it turns
out that the alleged hag is also the mother of a quisling soldier who is still hiding in the swamp,
and is responsible for a string of seemingly mysterious deaths in the marsh. Her witchcraft is,
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thus, debunked as a ruse that ought to keep the peasants away from the swamp, so her son can be
safe.
The romantic plot along the lines of Lake is obvious enough. Jure’s wife Vera is a selfcentered big city blonde who comes to the village with him; she is horrified with the dust, mud,
and the mosquitoes that attack her carefully maintained alabaster skin. Eventually, she leaves
Jure and the swampy village and he then turns to Bojka, a devout local girl who assists him in the
local ambulance, and who was in love with him while they were kids.
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FIGURE 4.15–16 From discord to harmony: Jure with Vera (left), and with Bojka
That being said, however, we should note that Vera is a far more fleshed out character
than Mato’s anonymous, one-note girlfriend in Lake. Her good-bye letter to Jure reveals that she
fully understands his motifs, yet, she cannot give up on her own vision of happiness for the sake
of his plans: “Do not be angry with me, but you once told me that you cannot be so dishonest to
leave this place, do you remember? So you see, I too cannot be so dishonest to myself and stay
here. I am too young for it. I would die here.[Ne ljuti se na mene, ali jednom davno si mi rekao da
ne možeš biti baš sasvim nepošten i otići odavde, sjećaš se? Eto vidiš, tako ni ja ne mogu biti baš
sasvim nepoštena prema sebi samoj i ostati ovdje. Premlada sam za to. Ja bih ovdje umrla.]” Vera’s
rhetoric and voice – as she is reading the letter in voiceover – does not reveal any malice or
resentment, but conveys benevolent empathy, thus making her motifs and actions easy to
understand, and not to condone. In that sense, she is an important step toward the self-centered
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city woman who can be “reformed”, that is, fully adjusted to her working man.
Zenica designates such a reform of the self-absorbed femininity. Boro is an engineer from
Belgrade who comes to work in the steel factory in Zenica, a Bosnian town that was one of the
key symbolic markers of rapid industrialization in Yugoslavia in general. When his wife Divna
enthusiastically and unexpectedly arrives after him, expecting that her husband dwells in a cozy
flat where two of them would make a family nest, to her disappointment, she finds that not only
Zenica is a provincial town, but also reveals that Boro lives in a shabby collective housing,
sharing a room with his nerdy and clumsy colleague Zdenko. Progressively embittered, Divna
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disregards her husband’s professional efforts, which results in especially dire consequences.
When Boro decides to spend some time more with Divna, in order to please her, Zdenko dies in a
factory accident while replacing him on the job.
Following the formula introduced by The Lake, Zenica also features a lovely local
ingénue who is in love with the main male protagonist, and who is more in-sync with the
revolutionary change than the self-centered big city girl. She is Emina, the daughter of the old
Muslim merchant who fell from the pre-war economic grace. Unlike her old father, who cannot
adapt to the new social reality and bemoans his fate, Emina readily quits the traditional ways,
stops wearing the veil, and goes to the steel factory in search for work. Needless to say, her crush
for Boro substantially buttresses her confrontation with the old ways and adopting of the modern,
socialist values. And yet, the film betrays the Lake formula in that regard: Boro tacitly rejects
Emina’s advances and sticks to Divna who will eventually be “reformed”.
Near the film’s end Boro and Divna have a major altercation. He slaps her, in arguably
the first open display of the positive hero perpetrating the marital violence in a socialism-set
film. Divna expressly packs up and leaves for the station, but eventually returns and roams the
factory looking for Boro (FIGURE 4.17–18), who, for his part, realized the harshness of his act
and is elsewhere looking for Divna to ask her for forgiveness. When they meet in the last scene,
Divna slaps Boro back and they both start laughing: the trauma of marital violence is gone in a
second. The final shot shows the spouses embrace against the background of the steel factory;
when they exit the frame, we are left to enjoy the industrial landscape behind them (FIGURE
4.19–20).
This time the socialist big Other is incarnated in Boro’s closest work fellows, who
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approvingly comment the reunion of the spouses. For the hardworking Hasan, the uneducated
simpleton with a crush for Emina, the sight of marital bliss that wins against all odds is the
paramount proof that he himself should marry. In that regard, Zenica marks another step in the
gender politics of the construction cycle: whereas Lake and It Was Not in Vain screened the
interclass romances between the middle-class men and the low-class ingénues, Zenica gives up
on such romantic affairs across the class lines. The film’s class segregationist politics did not
only vanquish the possibility of the inter-class romance, but, moreover, established the class
hierarchy: as the last scene illustrates, it is the middle class that sets up the template of the
romance and marital happiness for the working class.
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FIGURE 4.17–20 Divna roams the factory and makes up with Boro in Zenica
4.2.2. On That Night
Jovan Živanović’s next feature On That Night varied some of motifs from Zenica. Pavle is an
engineer working at the hydroelectric plant near a small Bosnian town, whereas his wife Marija
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is disappointed for being stuck in the middle of nowhere and having a husband who puts his job
before her. The arrival of Pavle’s new colleague Mirko precipitates the marital crisis that
eventually ends when the spouses mutually acknowledge their wrongs and commit to a fuller
mutual understanding. In comparison to Zenica, the film delivers more suspense and melodrama.
Whereas in Zenica Boro’s suspicion that Divna has an affair was obviously unfounded (his
“competition” was a significantly older man whom she never really considered a prospective
lover), Pavle’s suspicion of Marija’s infidelity is more founded. Mirko and Marija had been a
couple a long time ago, and since she has never told her husband about her ex-boyfriend, Pavle
suspects that she still carries a torch for Mirko.
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On the other side, On That Night complicates the class matters by creating two working
communities: the electricians, who work in the power plant (Pavle, Mirko, and their colleagues),
and the miners, who work in a nearby mine, embodying the middle class and the working class,
respectively. The film opens with a brawl between these two groups in a local tavern, when a
policeman is called in to stop the violence. The rest of the film can be seen as an attempt to
reconcile this class divide by means of the professional ethics that is designated as the
unabashedly masculine one. On the New Year’s Eve the miners are trapped underground due to a
mining accident; as the mine shaft is slowly filling with the water, Pavle and Mirko have to
repair the transmission tower that conveys the energy into the pumps that drain water out of the
mine, and save the miners from the imminent drowning. The inter-class animosity pales in face
of the disaster, as the professional ethics and the male camaraderie take over.
The film accentuates some class-specific gender nuances. The wives of the miners appear
to be at a more equal foot with their husbands, and relate to them in no-nonsense, straightforward
way: e.g. after the bar fight, they chastise the men for behaving irresponsibly. The mundane
simplicity of the lower-class gender relations evokes similar scenes in Zenica, where the poor,
uneducated women from the collective housing ridicule their husbands in everyday exchange.
However, while in Zenica those scenes played for laughs, their similes in On That Night yield the
deep and down-to-earth bond between the working class spouses. It transpires that the workingclass love does not leave space for melodramatic spectacle that, as we shall see, abounds in the
middle class romance.
However, while in Zenica at least one woman – Emina – used labour to overcome the
patriarchal norms, On That Night excludes the women from the industrial workplace, bounding
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them exclusively to the domestic sphere. At its most dramatic, the film renders the woman in the
industrial setting as equivalent to the old stereotype about the disastrous woman on the boat.
When Marija decides to spend New Year’s Eve with Pavle and Mirko in their shift in the power
plant, her presence causes the short circuit between them (no pun intended), bringing them to the
edge of dispute (FIGURE 4.21–22).
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FIGURE 4.21–22 The love triangle at the workplace in On That Night
Her husband assigns her with a responsible task: while he is away to fix the transmission tower,
she is supposed to answer a call from the mine and turn the electricity on if necessary, and thus
save the drowning miners. However, Marija undermines the task. First, she leaves the plant for a
while, and, later, she removes the handset from the phone, thus preventing the call from the
mine; at last, when she finally receives the call, she does not turn the electricity on, but runs
away looking for Pavle (FIGURE 4.23–26). Her worries are justified in light of her love for Pavle
(for the electricity might kill him while he is repairing the transmission tower), but unlike him
and Mirko, she is incapable of taking into account the lives of the miners, i.e. to empathize with
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anyone else outside her narrow private sphere.
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FIGURE 4.23–26 Marija fails to act and melodramatically runs away from the plant
In other words, the working men are able to suppress their interpersonal rivalry for the
sake of the professional commitment. Pavle and Mirko suspend their mutual animosity when the
unfortunate string of events reminds them that they are working colleagues who have to employ
all their skills and stamina in order to save the trapped miners, more than they are jealous rivals.
For them, there is a line between the personal sphere defined by (the heterosexual) love, and the
professional sphere defined by (the homosocial) work. From the vantage of macho work ethics,
the latter is superior to the former. The women – embodied in housewives – appear to be blind to
the line between the personal and the professional, between love and work, as they relate to work
only through love, or even disregard profession in the name of love. Whereas the hardworking
guys immediately realize the problem and try to solve it, Marija remains locked in her
melodramatic tunnel vision which boils everything down to love and jealousy. The film stresses
narcissistic aspects of her vantage: she even believes that the men would kill each other because
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of her. When Pavle tells her about the disaster in the mine, she accuses him that he concocted
that whole story only in order to send Mirko to the tower and electrocute him. When she finds
out that the disaster is real, she accuses Mirko that he used the macabre circumstances to scheme
the murder of Pavle. As if unable to grasp the banal reality, including the demanding nature of
labour, Marija translates it into a romantic soap opera in which everything revolves around her.
4.2.3. Only Human
Only Human is a paramount example of the melodramatic creation of the love couple at the
background of the construction site in the post-war years. Arguably the melodrama of Yugoslav
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cinema,65 the film is set in Bosnian mountains where a new giant water plant is getting built. The
main male protagonist is Bojkan, an engineer at the plant’s construction site, who lost one leg
while fighting as a partisan, whereas his love interest is Buba, a blind young woman of twentythree who arrives in the oculist clinic nearby. Buba lost her sight as a little girl, when a bomb
ravished her house killing the rest of her family. After ten years of being raised as both an orphan
and a blind, she wallows in lethargy and self-pity. Her doctor, professor Vrančić, greets her (and
introduces her to us) by saying: “Hello Sadness! [Dobar dan, tugo!]” – a telltale quote of the title
of the popular novel Bonjour Tristesse by Françoise Sagan. Vrančić – an old, benevolent
patriarch who combines the modern scientific knowledge and the traditional wisdom – realizes
that restoring the girl’s self-confidence and joy are integral to restoring her vision (FIGURE 4.27–
28). In order to prepare Buba for surgery, he sends her not in the sanatorium but in the mountain
lodge where “the jolly fellows”, as he calls Bojkan and his lively buddy Žarko, live with the
housemaid Ema.
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FIGURE 4.27–28 The feminine lethargy in Only Human
Although the budding friendship with Bojkan reinvigorates Buba, it is founded upon on a
lie as white as the idyllic snow-covered hills around them: he does not tell her about his
handicap. Buba hears the sound of Bojkan’s crutches, which he uses occasionally, when he is not
wearing his prosthetic leg, but she thinks that it is his walking cane. The film tries to come up
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Most of the critics lambasted the film, accusing Bauer for unintentionally making a melodrama, although he
decidedly aimed to do just that. More on the film’s production and reception see the interview with the director in
monograph on his opus (Polimac, 1985, pp. 80–92). The analysis of Only Human in the same volume, however,
disappoints by winding in the cheapest Freudianism (Despotović, 1985).
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with a convenient explanation for keeping the girl in the dark on this matter. Žarko tacitly pleads
to the engineer not to reveal the handicap, for that might cause Buba to feel like in a hospital
after all, and Bojkan agrees. However, after hearing how Buba besmirches the handicapped
people as “cripples” and “half-humans” (a symptom of her own self-pity), he is convinced that
she will be horrified by the sight of him once she restores her vision. When Žarko informs him
that the girl’s surgery was a success, he decides that she should never see him; as the power plant
is finished, he accepts the offer to move to a new construction site located in a distant part of the
country. Žarko, however, sabotages the engineer’s plans. He tells Buba the truth, and takes her to
the dam where Bojkan makes his final inspection. She rushes to meet Bojkan at the tiny and
shaky suspension bridge below the monumental dam. In the final scenes, the lovers are united in
a euphoric embrace, and the power plant is activated. As the wild torrents erupt from the
accumulation in a spectacular waterfall, the drops of water rain all over the couple (FIGURE 4.29–
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32).
FIGURE 4.29–32 The ecstatic finale of Only Human
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However, the over-the-top vision of romantic harmony, both sublime and ridiculous at the same
time, should not make us overlook the asymmetry between Buba and Bojkan in terms of their
power- and love relations. While Bojkan knows that Buba is blind all along, she falls for him
ignorant of his lack, and thus becomes additionally blind, as it were. Bojkan’s power over Buba
draws on his status of the highly respected man, the supreme combination of a fierce war veteran
and the impeccable worker with the untainted professional ethics. His physical handicap, it
appears, did not diminish his main assets (knowledge, commitment, and stamina), but only
cemented his social prestige. In a telling contrast, Buba’s handicap drives her in the opposite
direction: her sight has to be cured so she could be reintegrated into the worldshe is progressively
disconnecing herself from. In other words, the man’s handicap seems to have a greater social
value than the woman’s.
And yet, an uncanny feature taints Bojkan’s shining status. Every year, the first snow
reminds him of the day he lost the leg in the war. Haunted by the gloomy memories, Bojkan gets
drunk and bursts in anger, demolishing everything around him and even attacking the people
close to him. It is this lack of control, and not the physical handicap that truly testifies to
Bojkan’s incompleteness. Symptomatically, the film spares the viewers of the sight of Bojkan’s
wrath. At the beginning of the film, we find out that he smashed the local tavern the previous
night (i.e. before the film’s diegesis). At the same time, an abundance of jokes about the incident
– Bojkan himself making some of them – both contain and reveal the truly traumatic nature of
his loss of control over himself. Due to the very mechanism of humor, the jokes simultaneously
underplay Bojkan’s violent outbursts as the tolerable and ultimately insignificant caprice, and
cement the bitter knowledge that these fits of rage will persist as a symptom of the deep trauma
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that lurks behind the engineer’s respectable social status.
A closer look at the first part of the film reveals that Vrančić does not send Buba to
Bojkan’s lodge only to her benefit, but also to help the engineer resolve his “complex”, as the
doctor calls it. The engineer must keep his impeccable symbolic status of a model post-war
masculinity for the imagined gaze of the big Other of the Yugoslav socialist modernity. The
girl’s restored vision and her love should patch that last rupture in his otherwise flawless profile.
Her gaze serves as another one of Bojkan’s prosthesis, as it were, guaranteeing that he is still the
man, and that the gigantic dam is the supreme testimony to his masculine power. (Of course, the
monumental edifice can also be seen as a ridiculously obscene symptom of his impotence, like
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the proverbial gigantic cars, houses, and guns, some men use to compensate for their inferiority
or insecurity).
Tellingly, Bojkan and Buba do not kiss in the final scene, but turn to the enthused
workers on the top of the dam; triumphantly, Buba yells that now she can see them (FIGURE
4.33–34). Thus we get the self-reflexive logic of big Other and love at its purest: what bonds
Buba and Bojkan in the final shots is not simply their mutual affection, but the insight that their
love entices the gaze of the big Other. That is the true value of Buba’s restored sight: she literally
becomes the key eye-witness that the big Other exists after all. Her love with Bojkan makes the
world around them meaningful and consistent (at least provisionally).
FIGURE 4.33–34 Love under the gaze of the big Other
The film in which everybody tries to pamper the blind girl, thus, reveals itself to be about the
pampering of masculinity as something that is imperfect and fallible; any attempt to maintain the
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illusion of social harmony has to include concealing that masculine lack. Bojkan is not an
exception in that regard; virtually all male protagonists cope with the imperfections that
challenge their masculinity-related entitlement. They use different strategies: one of the workers
at the construction site pities himself for being bald, already, at the age of twenty-five (FIGURE
4.35); Vrančić uses Buba’s case to prove to his rival colleague that he is still a great surgeon
despite his old age; Bojkan’s buddy Žarko, for the most part of the film, denies his imperfections
by means of humor, and yet at one point cracks up, bursting into the most dramatic exercise in
the self-mourning masculinity. One evening he brilliantly plays Chopin’s “Sadness” on the
piano; his friends are astonished, since they knew that he hates the instrument. Žarko then
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reveals that a long time ago he was married for eight years, but his wife left him for a pianist;
although the piano was his old passion, therefore, he quit playing it. That way, even the biggest
joker and philanderer in the film is unmasked as an insecure man who licks his wounds and does
not want to give his heart to a new woman who could hurt him again (FIGURE 4.36).
FIGURE 4.35–36 The masculine insecurity and self-pity in Only Human
Of course, my point is not that men cannot be as insecure, traumatized and vulnerable, but what
makes gender politics of Only Human dubious in light of this analysis is the difference it makes
between the men’s and women’s incompleteness on one hand, and their relation to work and
profession on another. The film defines all major male protagonists – Bojkan, Žarko, Vrančić –
first and foremost in terms of their work ethics and professional achievements, whereas the only
female protagonist that has a job is Ema, Žarko’s and Bojkan’s housemaid. However, by
insisting that she is actually over heels in love with Žarko, the film even strips her work of
professional credibility, and turns it into the substitute for her non-existent romantic life, an
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ersatz marriage. There is also one other gender difference at play: while the men bond by means
of genuine camaraderie, the women lack such natural solidarity among themselves, for,
predictably, they fight over men (as illustrated by the animosity between Ema and Lela, one of
Žarko’s many flings). The male privilege wins the day again: both the woman and the man can
be traumatized and handicapped, but, while he can reaffirm himself in the public, professional
sphere and homosocial bonding, she can restore her lack only through the romantic attachment to
him.
A detail about the film’s production is a telltale: the working title of the film was Traces
[Tragovi], and it referred to ski lessons that Bojkan gives to Buba, as she learns to ski by
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following his traces in the snow. At one point, Buba complains that there is only one trace of
Bojkan’s skies, not two, in the snow – which is not a surprise to the audience, for we see that
one-legged Bojkan is using one ski only. It is as if, at that moment, Only Human most overtly
acknowledges that female subjectivity cannot follow the trajectory of the male subject, or, even,
that the woman remains a subject who structurally, as it were, reveals the lie about the man’s
completeness. Generally, however, Only Human – despite’s Buba’s blurting the truth at the ski
slope – follows the traces of the previously analyzed films that used the romance to cement the
fundamental lie about the male privilege: the woman’s main role is to follow her man, and stand
as the main guarantee of his triumph that is first and foremost grounded in professional work,
wwhich is key to the man’s social symbolic mandate.
Although not a construction film, Vratiću se/I Will Be Back (1957, Jože Gale) is worth
comparing to Only Human as another contemporary melodrama about the romantic troubles of a
former partisan who lost his leg in the war. A former partisan lieutenant, Branko, tries his best to
continue with his life despite the grief and self-pity about his handicap. A pregnant scene finds
him in a restaurant garden, drinking alone and bitterly gazing at the legs of young couples
dancing to the mambo “Brasil” on the nearby dance floor (FIGURE 4.37–38). A dancing couple
approaches him: it is Branko’s acquaintance with the same handicap, with his girl. He
benevolently criticizes Branko for being too gloomy and ascribes that to the fact that he issingle:
“You still have not found a girl? You are wrong! Those dark thoughts would soon abandon you
if you had! [Još nisi našao devojku!? Grešiš! Brzo bi te napustile crne misli!]” In another scene,
when he talks about the upcoming wedding and invites Branko to be his best man, he repeats his
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advice: “Fall in love, man, that will cure you! [Zaljubi se, čoveče, to će te izlečiti!]”
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FIGURE 4.37–38 The handicapped man facing his lack in I Will Be Back
FIGURE 4.39–42 The scenes from the loveless marriage in I Will Be Back
Branko, for his part, meets his first love Jana, a young woman caught for ten years in a loveless
upper-middle class marriage with Ivan, a man who is not only significantly older than her, but is
also an archaeology professor. The film opens with the scenes of the everyday routine of the
unhappy spouses, and contains the notion of Jana being a trophy wife by inviting us to empathize
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with the misfortunate housewife whose youth and vitality are incompatible with her old
husband’s penchant for the past.
However, despite prompting us to understand Jana’s unhappiness, I Will Be Back uses the
same matrix of gender and work that we saw in the previously analyzed film: whereas Jana has
no professional ambition at all, Ivan is utterly dedicated to his work. At first, it transpires that the
film criticizes this asymmetry as part of their marital problems, yet it turns out that the same
pattern shapes other characters and relationships as well. The film, thus, features an employed
woman in the episode figure of Ivan’s colleague and assistant, but her professional attachment
boils down to romantic impulse as well: she is secretly in love with Ivan. Branko also has a
professional ambition, and it is not for nothing that the only encounter between him and Ivan
happens in Branko’s office: at first, Branko believes that the cuckolded husband came to discuss
the love triangle, but then it turns out that the visit is strictly professional. Jana has no problem
with being socio-economically dependent on a successful professional man; she just wants to be
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dependent on the man whom she loves.
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FIGURE 4.43–46 Jana’s voluntarily blindness and isolation
In a triumph of his ravaged masculine ego, Branko murders a man who mocked him in
public as a crippled hero, i.e. as a loser. He might be seeing himself as worthy of Jana’s love, but
he is too pathetically obsessed with protecting his masculine pride to let the passing joker off
unpunished. The fact that Branko’s violent male narcissism cancels the romantic future, clearly
shows that he hangs onto his own ego more than onto his genuine love for Jana. In another
curious parallel to Only Human, the film’s ending plays with the motif of female blindness. As
Jana and Branko embrace for one last time on his way to prison, he closes her eyes with his
palm, and asks her to stay that way: “Do not look after me. Imagine that I have traveled away! I
will be back... [Nemoj da gledaš za mnom. Zamisli da sam otputovao! Vratiću se...]” The
women’s vision, thus, again functions as main guarantee of the man’s integrity, but this time in
reverse. While Bojkan needed Buba’s sight to make him complete in Only Human, Branko needs
Jana’s “blindness”: if she does not see his lack, he can pretend that it does not really exist. Jana
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accepts this role and, as the camera tracks out in the final shot, she keeps her eyes closed. By
obeying Branko’s request, she refuses to be an eye-witness of his utter demise, and thus at least
grants him with a provisional sense of completeness. However, by this “blindness”, Jana refuses
to admit not only Branko’s, but also her own demise as well. Now, more than ever, she is defined
by her relation to the man. Not only will she most probably remain in her marriage with Ivan
upon whom she depends socio-economically, but she is also bounded to Branko with the promise
that she will wait for him until he returns from jail. As the last shot diminishes her to a tiny
figure-speckle in the empty stark corridor, it also connotes that Jana’s dependence on the men
translates into her loneliness and isolation (FIGURE 4.43–46).
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4.2.4. Section B
The construction cycle 1948–1958 closes with Section B, a film about the oil-drilling in the
federal province of Vojvodina. Not being a melodrama but a comedy, the film is less interested
in romance and more in creating a buddy–buddy tandem of two main male protagonists (or
“bromance”, if we are to use the jargon of contemporary Hollywood). It matches a young, sky-isthe-limit engineer Dejan, with Mane, an older, experienced driller who had worked on the oil
rigs in South America and the US for twenty years; with his nickname Caracas, the Panama hat,
mustache, and a bizarre mixture of English, Spanish, and Serbo-Croatian, he is unambiguously
the heart of the film.
FIGURE 4.47–48 The couple of working buddies in Section B
True, each of the two men engage in a romance of sorts. Mane becomes a tenant “with benefits”
for his landlady, a vivacious widow who develops a crush on him. Dejan is attracted to Branka,
the daughter of his superior, who visits their oil rig to pass time until her next faculty exam. 66
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The women thus incarnate two opposite, yet complementary stereotypes: the older possessive
and suffocating woman eager to domesticate the man, and the younger, elusive tease incapable of
true commitment. The man should run away from the first one, for she might domesticate him, as
it were,while the second one is unattainable, for she is the one who runs away from the man.
However, once the eruption of the oil marks the end of the work on the rig, the already
tentative romances dissolve. Branka quits flirting with Dejan and returns to her studies, fitting
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Given the film’s preference for Mane as the real protagonist, it does not surprise that the fling between Dejan
and Branka is the least accomplished plot thread, which merely rehashes the stereotype of the frivolous woman who
is interested more in appearance and social status, than in real love. In his generally positive review of Section B,
Dragoslav Adamović chastised the character of Branka as the weakest element in the film: she is “so out-of-place [...]
that it is almost tragic [toliko falš ... da je to gotovo tragično]” (1959, p. 125).
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the stereotype of the big city girl who cannot stand the mud and dust of the countryside. Mane
succumbs to his nomadic impulse and sets himself in search for another oil rig, leaving his
landlady. The ending scene of Dejan and Mane meeting on the road, and driving away into a new
adventure reaffirms the superiority of the homosocial work solidarity over the heterosexual
romance. Whereas Zenica, On That Night, and Only Human unambiguously lauded the
camaraderie as integral to macho work ethics, the conventions of melodrama pressed them to
eventually give the heterosexual romance its due. Section B, however, provides us with a
vehemently macho coda to the construction cycle 1948–1958: in the world of the real labour,
only a man can deeply understand another man, and the woman necessarily remain outside their
domain in which virility and professional intertwine; the man and the woman surely can develop
an erotic attachment, but its depth and complexity are no match for a much more substantial
professional attachment that the man shares with his working fellow. Whereas the working
buddies at the drill rig rejoice without abandon when the oil erupts, splashing all over them
(FIGURE 4.49–50), the women are unable to grasp and properly enjoy the triumph of labour:
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Branka protests that Dejan, all covered with oil, will smear her dress (FIGURE 4.51–52).
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FIGURE 4.49–52 Where the men see the fruits of hard labour, the women see merely dirt
Section B’s coda to the construction cycle will be a rather elusive one: in 1960, the film got a
sequel Bolje je umeti/It Is Better to Know How (again directed by Nanović), which follows Dejan
and Mane Caracas in new adventures. I will return to the sequel in the next subchapter, but for
the time being it suffices to say that it vehemently gives up on construction and labour.
However, to say that the construction cycle closed with Section B in 1958 by no means
amounts to saying that labour-and-construction vanished from the classical Yugoslav cinema, let
alone from Yugoslav cinema altogether. As we shall see in the following chapter, the early 1960
will see a few important films set on the construction sites of socialist modernity; however, they
will operate with substantially new subjects and plots. Out of the crucial importance for
establishing that difference is the watershed moment of Yugoslav cinema in 1959, when several
proto-modernist films dispelled the optimistic notion that Yugoslav modernity is innately
harmonious, and offered protagonists whose life stories showed that the socialist project is “out
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of joint”, suffused with contradictions and aporias, i.e. – to put it in Lacanese – that the socialist
big Other does not exist. Unlike those films – and the new construction-set films that will
unravel along the same lines – the 1948–1958 construction cycle still operated within the
optimistic paradigm: not only did they render the socialist harmony attainable, but they also
pointed to the romantic happiness as the main index of this social orderliness. I argue that we
ought to keep that in mind while historicizing them in the following pages.
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4.3.
The erasure of labour and the rise of the consumerist spectacle
After addressing specific films, we can now synthesize the major tendencies in representing
gender, romance, and labour in the construction cycle. The most elemental and ubiquitous is the
gender asymmetry in relation to work:
(1) with his immediate and substantial relation to work, the man is the natural born worker,
as it were; his chief symbolic mandate or status is the professional one; the romantic
attachments are secondary for him, therefore barely cloud his professional choices and
actions; the libidinal economy of his relation to work is homosocial;
(2) the woman cannot relate to work directly or substantially, but does it via the man whom
she loves; as her romantic attachment to the man is the precondition for her working
experience, her professional status is secondary to those that define her relation to the
man (the lover, wife...); the libidinal economy of her relation to work is heterosexual.
The most dramatic result of the gradual and shifting, yet steady affirmation of this gender
asymmetry in the 1948–1958 construction cycle, is the vanishing of the celluloid women worker,
i.e. her replacement with the figure of a housewife. Fully committed to the professional and
ideological cause, this woman labourer embodies the socialist gender empowerment through
work. The ideological attachment gives her strength to endure and confront the love spells and
the dangers of patriarchy. In that sense, she is independent of the man: although she can be in
love with a man or even married, she is not afraid to leave him if she feels that he compromised
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her integrity in any way, including her relation to the socialist cause or work.
Only two characters in early Yugoslav cinema fit this profile. Mara in The Life is Ours,
but only to an extent, for the film eventually challenges her preference for work over love with
the counter-example of Stana; that makes Marija in Story of a Factory the only emancipated
woman worker in classical Yugoslav cinema, as fleshed out as one could get in the socialist
realist vein, somewhere between a typage and a character. This representation coincides with the
cult of labour in the late 1940s and its apogee in the phenomenon of the so-called shock-workers,
many of them women employed in the textile industry: although never explicitly labelled as the
shock-worker, Marija most certainly qualifies for that status. However, the exceptionality of her
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image in early classical cinema testifies that the cult of work and socialist realism failed to
produce a Yugoslav gallery of the women labourers as they did in the rest of the socialist Europe,
as described by Hanáková.
Instead, the gender asymmetry expressly demoted the working woman, by succumbing
her to the imperative of love. This type of the women worker is incarnated in the girl who
recognizes the emancipating capacity of socialism and labour, but never becomes a worker in her
own right, as her professional and ideological commitment is defined via her romantic
attachment to her man: Jana in Blue 9, Mara in Lake or Bojka in It Was Not in Vain. The
employed ingénue is a symptomal representation, the compromise formation that tries to
reconcile the still officially propagated doctrines of the socialist emancipation-via-work and
gender equality on one hand, and the reaffirmation of the male privilege and the public/private
divide in patriarchal terms. These girls who approach work with one eye on her romantic partner
thus for the first time in Yugoslav cinema reveal “a painful discrepancy between the rhetoric of
women’s emancipation and the gradual objectification of women’s bodies, desires and wishes”
(Jambrešić Kirin and Blagaić, 2013, p. 64).
In the final blow to the woman’s relation to work in the construction films of 1957 and
1958, the employed ingénues moves out to make a space for the housewife. Despite being
defined via her man, the ingénue still nurtured some ideological awareness and professional
ambition. The housewife, however, is rendered as the exemplary woman utterly devoid of any
professional ambition and ideological consciousness, and isolated in domestic sphere. By this
point in Yugoslav cinema, the motif of labour has lost its empowering capacity for women, with
romance becoming the only factor that shapes her life.
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An analogous outline of the man’s relation to work is equally telling. The male privilege,
posited by gender asymmetry, persists throughout the whole cycle, but there are considerable
shifts with regard to class. We should not forget that Zdravko in Blue 9 is the last male
protagonist of the cycle who comes from the working class. In the 1957–1958 films, the figures
of middle-class technical intelligentsia – engineers and doctors – take central stage, whereas the
working class men are relegated into the supporting roles, marginalized in the characters whose
lives are dependent on the actions of their superior, middle-class protagonists. The notion of
macho work ethics – integral to the supposedly intrinsic link between masculinity and work –
can be seen as an attempt to soften the class barrier between the working and middle class. The
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assumption of the male camaraderie boils down to the denial of the class factor: the men are
substantially defined in terms of their deep, natural, attachment to work and their gender-based
solidarity, their class belonging becoming secondary.
At the most fundamental level, we should use this tension between the blue collar and
white collar men as indicative of the fact that the man’s relation to work is as complex as the
women’s. In other words, each gender’s relation to work is inconsistent and socially mediated; it
is only that the patriarchal norms privilege the men’s relation to work by showing it as natural
and innate. The antagonisms that suffuse the man’s relation to work – i.e. the repressed truth that
lurks underneath the image of the man as the “natural born worker” – thus resurfaces and erupts
in the clash between the working class men and the middle class men. To heal that breach (the
male interclass camaraderie in Zenica, On That Night and Only Human; the bromance of Mane
and Dejan in Section B) is to reaffirm the naturalness of the man as a being-of-work.
All these interrelated shifts in the celluloid representation of gender and labour should be
historicized as integral to the broad socio-political and economic reshuffling of Yugoslav
socialism, as outlined in the introductory chapter: a turn from the world or utopia of production
toward the one of consumerism – arguably the central contradiction of the Yugoslav socialist
modernity –, which was generally symptomatic of “the exhaustion of the revolutionary morale”
(Jambrešić Kirin and Blagaić, 2013, p. 57), and, specifically, of the exhaustion of the
revolutionary morale in terms of gender emancipation. The Yugoslav economic rise in the 1950s
and the openness for the ideological and cultural influences from the West, only buttressed the
reaffirmation of patriarchy. The colourful and friendly world of home appliances, fashion, and
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advertisement paved the road to consumption, the imperative of which dethroned the imperative
of production. In another concise phrasing by Jambrešić Kirin and Blagaić, “The turn from the
world of production to the world of consumption was decisive for women’s unfinished political
subjectivation. It was accompanied by the political pasivization of women and their sexualisation
in the public sphere” (2013, p. 59). The lure of the consumerist utopia, adopted from the
capitalist West, thus catalyzed the symbiosis of socialism and patriarchy in a common project of
“reinstating the discourses of femininity and domesticity” (Jambrešić Kirin and Blagaić, 2013,
pp. 56–57), during which the women “were implicitly told to realize their desire for happiness
and a better future in the place where they had relative power and control: in their homes and
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through their own body” (Jambrešić Kirin and Blagaić, 2013, pp. 63). The figure of the
housewife gave body to such a “re-domesticated woman”, who depends on the male breadwinner
but who actually rules – or believe that she rules – her own domain as the mistress of the modern
household and the heroine of the leisure lifestyle. Again, a Greimas rectangle comes handy in
classification of the main character types produced by contradictions between production and
consumption, and patriarchy and emancipation:
As we can see, one slot in the scheme remains empty: the construction cycle failed to designate a
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type of character that would embody the gender emancipation in the conditions of the
consumerist utopia. This absence is all the more perplexing given the popularity of a character
type that apparently fits that position. It was the so-called “mondain woman”, whose portrait is
published in the Yugoslav Filmska enciklopedija (drawing upon the 1963 typology of the film’s
characters Sozialgeschichte der Stars by German film critic Enno Patalas). The mondain woman
is
a figure of the self-reliant, often self-centered woman, materially independent of the man, and a
spiritually independent woman who emancipated herself (hence the alternative label for the type
– an emancipated woman); she is characterized by self-awareness, contempt for conventions,
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much life experience (hence the common label – a worldly woman), ambition [...]. Related to that
are the quality of her communication skills: ranging from aggression to extreme restraint,
expressing superiority (sometimes with a dose of cynicism) – these features vary depending on
the period when the films were made, and their topic and genre.
lik samostalne, često samožive, o muškarcu materijalno i duhovno neovisne žene koja se
emancipirala (otuda altern. naziv tipa — emancipirana žena); odlikuju je i samosvijest, prezir
prema konvencijama, veće životno iskustvo (odatle i čest naziv — svjetska žena), ambicioznost
[...]. S tim u svezi su i značajke njezina komuniciranja: u rasponu od agresivnosti do izrazite
suzdržanosti, iskazivanje superiornosti (ponekad i s dozom cinizma) — odlike što variraju ovisno
o razdoblju nastanka filmova, te o njihovoj temi i žanru.
(Peterlić, 1990, p. 166, original emphasis)
The mondaine woman appeared, for the first time, in the cinema after WWI, “as a reflection of
an increased emancipation of the woman (later corresponding with the feminist tendencies as
well) [kao odraz ubrzane emancipacije žene (kasnije korespondirajući i s feminističkim
tendencijama)]”, and after a relative disappearance during WWII regains popularity in the 1950s,
when she loses her romantic and eccentric traits, and “signifies the contemporary woman aware
of her own equality [označuje suvremenu ženu svjesnu svoje ravnopravnosti]” (Mondenka, 1990,
p. 166). Among the actresses that played this type – from Hollywood in 1940s to the European
cinema in the 1960s – some of the most iconic were Deborah Kerr, Lea Massari, Melina
Mercouri, Jeanne Moreau, Patricia Neal, and Simone Signoret. Although Yugoslav cinema in the
1950s most certainly had some prominent actresses who fitted the type (e.g. Marija Kohn,
Olivera Marković, Mia Oremović, or Olga Spiridonović), the Yugoslav mondenka had extremely
spotty, volatile presence. Most importantly, for this particular analysis, she never appeared in the
construction cycle as a worldly and self-aware antidote to the re-domesticated woman who
depends on her man.
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To rephrase it more pointedly: the mondaine woman is incommensurable with the world
of the romanticized technical intelligentsia, which is characteristic of the construction cycle. This
romanticization or idealization, conveyed by privileging the male professional exclusively, is
analogous to the lionization of technical intelligentsia in the Soviet Union. Commenting on the
privileged place that the technical intelligentsia held in the works of Boris Arvatov, one of the
Russian theorists of productivism, Branislav Dimitrijević notices that
The romanticization of the “technical intelligentsia” was an immediate response to the
romanticization of the proletariat, and was founded upon the premise that unlike the bourgeoisie,
the technical intelligentsia works closely with the proletariat, understands the conditions of their
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work and does not rule over the means of production. Hence, it can be act in solidarity with the
labourers and serve them as a role model, because it lacks their “primitive habits”, and can not
only help organizing the work, but also help erase the alienating dualism between the work and
everyday life, which was crucial for Arvatov.
Romantizacija “tehničke inteligencije” bila je neposredni odgovor na romantizaciju proleterijata, i
bila je zasnovana na pretpostavci da za razliku od sitnosopstveničke buržoazije tehnička
inteligencija radi u tesnoj sprezi sa proleterijatom, razume okolnosti njihovog rada i ne vlada nad
sredstvima za proizvodnju. Tako može biti solidarna sa radnicima a poslužiti im kao uzor, jer
upravo nema one njihove “primitivne navike” te može ne samo pomoći u organizaciji rada već i u
onom što je za Arvatova bilo ključno, brisanju otuđujućeg dualizma između rada i svakodnevice.
(Dimitrijević, 2012)
The working class was fascinated with the bourgeois everyday life based on the alienation of
production and consumption, “styl-ism and fashion” being, for Arvatov, its exemplary
manifestations (1997, p. 124); the technical intelligentsia, however, was supposed to vanquish
this fascination by providing another model of everyday that would not be founded on the schism
between production and consumption. One could argue that the middle class protagonists of the
construction cycle – the engineers and their housewives – were supposed to function in a similar
way. In my view, however, the gender asymmetry and the male privilege in relation to work
fatally thwarted that intention. Even if the male technical intelligentsia could have embodied a
new type of bond between the production and the consumption, the women did not fit the picture,
as their relation to production was first diminished to the side-effect of their romantic feelings,
and later they were detached from the wage labour altogether. (In other words, this explains why
the figure of a female engineer – or some other analogous middle-class employed woman that
could be a breadwinner – was never the central protagonist in the construction films in the late
1950s.)
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The glamorization of the women and her displacement into the leisure setting was not
limited to the construction cycle. Although Blue 9 certainly contains the seeds of this tendency,
we found its first unambiguous expression in Svi na more/Off to the Seaside (1952, Sava
Popović), the comedy that was critically dismissed due to its dilettante realization. However, it is
Vesna (1953, František Čap) that remains the landmark achievement in this regard. This
romantic high-school story offered the Yugoslavs a blend of a romantic comedy of mistaken
identities crammed with pretty girls, handsome boys, music, fashion, and – on top of everything
– airplanes and parachuting. Compared with the rest of the Yugoslav cinema at the time, Vesna
indeed looked as if it flew in directly from Hollywood; it triggered a nation-wide craze,
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becoming, not only a blockbuster, but a social phenomenon.67 It was not surprising that Vesna
was the first Yugoslav film that got a sequel Ne čakaj na maj/Don’t Whisper (1957, Čap), which
uses the story of the minor love strife as pretext for delivering even more music and sports (set in
an resort in the Alps, the film mixes romance with the joys of winter just like Only Human).
However, with every new Čap’s film the critics increasingly lambasted the director: while
usually acknowledging his technical skills, they criticized his images of Yugoslav socialist
modernity as fairytale-like. The paramount example of that criticism was the vehement dismissal
of The Doors Remain Open (1959), when Čap was accused, among other things, for designating
Konjic, a provincial town in Bosnia, as The Azure Coast or Monte Carlo, and making the
working girls in a local textile factory looking as ballerinas or big-city students (Čolić, 1959).
Vladimir Pogačić’s omnibus Subotom uveče/Saturday Evening (1957), most certainly did not
“hollywoodized” the Yugoslav quotidian as Čap’s films did, yet its first and the last segment,
both revolving around the love stories, effectively belonged to the same category of the films that
presented modernity through more conventional romantic narratives. Vladimir Pogačić’s
omnibus Subotom uveče/Saturday Evening (1957), most certainly did not “hollywoodized” the
Yugoslav quotidian as Čap’s films did, yet its first and the last segment, both revolving around
the love stories, effectively belonged to the same category of the films that presented modernity
through more conventional romantic narratives. Of course, this telegraphically short account
cannot do justice to the ambiguities and contradictions which most certainly existed in these
films, but it is safe to say that that segment of Yugoslav cinema dominantly maintained the
notion of necessity of romance and reaffirmation of the matrimony as, proverbially, the
fundamental social cell.
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For the purpose of this analysis, it is important to note that the glamorization structurally,
as it were, was aimed at censoring the work and class matters: the problems of the working class
were utterly evaded or softened. The problem culminated in 1960, with the rise of the estrada
comedies, which I tackled in the introductory chapter. Incidentally, It Is Better to Know How, the
sequel to Section B, is exemplary of these films. The sequel blatantly replaced the original film’s
focus on work with the one on leisure, tourism and entertainment: Dejan and Mane arrive in a
small town on the Adriatic coast, and instead of finding oil, they help the locals boost tourism by
67
See, for example, Marcel Štefančič’s account of Vesna in the second chapter of his book Maškarada (2013),
tellingly titled “Problem of the first Slovenian Hollywood [Problem prvega slovenskega Hollywooda]”.
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launching a music festival, which were in vogue during those years. Whereas Section B boasted
many scenes of labour, showing some dirty and dangerous oil drilling (FIGURE 4.53–54), It Is
Better to Know How utterly devoted itself to the colourful (literally) spectacle of comedy, music
and tourism (FIGURE 4.55–56). Also, it is more than a convenient coincidence that It is Better to
Know How features the first flamboyant display of female nudity in a colour socialist-set film:
the spectators have a full view on the completely bare backsides of the two women who are
sunbathing in the nude, whereas, at the moment they jump up from their towels, and right before
they cover themselves up again, we get flashed by the girls breasts and behinds, bathed in the sun
light (FIGURE 4.57–58).68 This shift from the spectacle of labour in Section B to the spectacle of
sex and entertainment in It is Better to Know How, thus, in a nutshell, stands for the shift from
the utopia of production to the utopia of consumption in the second half of the Yugoslav 1950s.
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FIGURE 4.53–54 The spectacle of labour in Section B
68
This was not the first denuding of a woman’s breast in a socialist-set Yugoslav film though. Male stvari/Little
Things (1957, Boško Kosanović), a melodrama about marital fidelity, offered a scene where an episodic female
character tries to seduce the main male protagonist, by denuding and jumping in the sea before him. However, the
final outcome was a technical underachievement, just as the rest of that excruciatingly primitive film: as the
filmmaker opted for the “American night” technique, the breasts are barely visible and appear for just a blink on
screen.
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FIGURE 4.55–56 The spectacle of estrada in It is Better to Know How
FIGURE 4.57–58 The spectacle of sex in It is Better to Know How
Even the critics, who were willing to admit that the films like It is Better to Know How or Ljubav
i moda/Love and Fashion (1960) are not utterly worthless and have their purpose within the
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national film industry, would eventually admit their cringing detachment from contemporary
reality. For example, Dušan Makavejev (1961a) argued that although Love and Fashion may not
be up there with Hollywood musicals, nevertheless, it is not inferior to the French musicals as
Folies-Bergère (1956, Henri Decoin); and yet he felt obliged to stress that Love and Fashion
belongs to the batch of films that he labels “narcosis” (Makavejev, 1961b). In 1962, Branko
Vučićević launched arguably the harshest attack on the estrada comedies, by accusing them of
courting to the “technocrats” – the upper and upper-middle class of managers and technical
intelligentsia who are out of touch with the masses of workers and peasantry:
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[Those are] the people whose activity has “palpable”, concrete stimuli: the cars, houses, furniture,
travels, clothes in vogue, all [...] palpable objects that can be sold, exchanged, which have their
material value and entice bodily enjoyment. And yet, all of these surpass the exclusively material
sphere: they are all a means to social affirmation, prestige, some fictive pleasure... [Therefore,]
what is the profession of the heroes of our films? Apparently, they are mostly technocrats or their
entertainers. Yugoslav cinema is slowly shifting to a cinematic chronicle of an idealized “high
life”. A technocrat is completely indifferent toward the people who have neither opportunity nor
possibility to “spend the most and most rationally”, he does not know those handicapped
consumers really well. Hence it is no wonder that our cinema is like that. It does not care about
the spring sowing; it does not want to know about the warehouse worker who embezzled three
millions of dinars, because his wife complained that he does not know how to manage in life, and
he was also reprimanded for coming to work plainly dressed; it does not give a damn for the bad
tuberculosis-stricken girl whose family lives from 15.000 dinars per month, the monthly income
of the invalid father; etc. As if the big and hard changes are not happening, as if the peasants do
not make half of the population, as if life is a continuous festival of popular melodies, and the
biggest problem is finding the right combination in a contest organized by Severin’s Whiskey.
[To su] ljudi čija delatnost ima “opipljiv”, konkretan stimulans: automobile, kuća, oprema stana,
putovanje, odelo po modi, sve [...] opipljivi predmeti koji se mogu prodati, zameniti, imaju svoju
materijalnu vrednost i svi izazivaju telesna uživanja. Pa ipak, svi prevazilaze isključivo
materijalnu sferu: svi su sredstvo društvene afirmacije, prestiža, nekakvog fiktivnog
zadovoljstva ... [Dakle,] šta su po zanimanju junaci naših filmova? Videće se, to su mahom
tehnokrate ili njihovi zabavljači. Jugoslovenski film se polako pretvara u kinematografsku
hroniku idealizovanog “high life”. Tehnokrata je do Kosova ravnodušan prema ljudima koji
nemaju prilike ni mogućnosti da “najviše i najracionalnije troše”, te hendikepirane potrošače on i
ne poznaje dobro. Nije ni čudo što je često i naš film takav. Zato se ne brine o proletnoj setvi:
neće da zna ni za magacionera koji je proneverio tri miliona dinara jer mu je žena zamerala da ne
zna se snadje u životu, a predbacivali su mu da na posao dolazi suviše neugledno obučen; ni brige
njega za nevaljalu tuberkuloznu devojčicu čija porodica živi od 15000 mesečno, prihoda oca
invalida itd. Krupne i teške promene kao da se ne degadjaju, kao da polovinu stanovništva ove
zemlje ne sačinjavaju seljaci, kao da je život neprekidan festival zabavnih melodija, a najveći
problem pronalaženje prave kombinacije u nagradnom takmičenju koje organizuje Severin's
Whiskey.
(quoted in Bogojević, 2013, pp. 237–238)69
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In retrospect, knowing that Vučićević was soon to become one of the most prominent novi film
screenwriters, this harsh criticism of the overtly commercialized images of the “high life” in
Yugoslavia sounds almost programmatic, as it were. The crucial confirmation of that can be
found in the famous manifesto-like article “Za jednu drukčiju kinematografiju [For a Different
Cinema]”, the open letter signed by many filmmakers and critics from all over Yugoslavia,
during the national film festival in Pula in 1966.70 Among other things, the letter acknowledged
69
Bogojević spots that this class-aware criticism remains gender-blind: the underpaid labourer, who comitted a
crime, was actually prompted to do it by a nagging wife – housewife? – who questioned his aptness (2013, p. 238, fn.
687).
70
Apparently penned by Makavejev and Vučićević, the letter was signed by Karpo Aćimović Godina, Branko
Belan, Vojko Duletič, Boštjan Hladnik, Srdjan Karanović, Vatroslav Mimica, Krsto Papić, Živojin Pavlović,
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the importance of the “commercial cinema [komercijalna kinematografija]” and even praises its
“day-dreaming and consumerist [sanjarska i potrošačka]” dimension as innate to all of the
cinema, but argued against the passivity that it bestows upon the cinemagoers and called for a
cinema that would imply the “more active audience – the critically minded viewer [aktivniju
publiku – kritičkog gledaoca]” (Za jednu drukčiju kinematografiju, 1966, original emphasis).
Unlike the vantage that defines novi film/“the black wave” first and foremost via opposition
toward the communist doctrines, Vučićević’s article and the 1966 letter suggest that the celluloid
consumerist utopia, both glamorous and soporific, was one of the principal targets of the novi
film tendencies.
4.4.
Conclusion
Several elements of the construction films illustrate the waning of the value of labour and
production, and, consequently, of the working class in Yugoslav society in the 1950s, and the
rise of the “consumerist utopia” and the values usually assigned to (or embodied by) the middle
class. The main mechanism of that gradual, yet, irreversible debasement was a gender
asymmetry, which posited man as a being of work, and the celluloid woman as a being of
romance. Hence, these films dramatically support the feminist thesis of the re-patriarchalization
of the Yugoslav gender order in the 1950s.
However, it should be noted that this process was in no way a Yugoslav specificity.
Grosso modo, the classical Yugoslav cinema re-domesticated the women in much the same way
as Hollywood in the 1950s. It suffices to recall Jackie Byars’ re-elaboration of the insights of
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Marjorie Rosen, Molly Haskell, and Brandon French: when she describes how “the increasingly
frightening specter of the Working Woman, conflated with the Woman Alone, began to haunt the
melodramas early in the 1950s” (Byars, 1991, p. 64), we get the template of the gender-related
anxieties that haunted the classical Yugoslav cinema as well. The fact that the imperative of
romance marked such two distinct ideological climates (inclusive of the respective cinemas), as
those in the US and Yugoslavia, perfectly illustrates the global scale of the post-war restoration
of patriarchal privilege. Of course, a more detailed comparison between the re-domestication of
Vladimir Petek, Aleksandar Petrović, Jože Pogačnik, and Lordan Zafranović – to name but a few. Interestingly, the
recent accounts of the “black wave” (DeCuir, 2011; Kirn, Stojanović, and Testen, 2012) prefer to pass in silence
over this important document.
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femininity in Hollywood and the Yugoslav cinema in the 1950s would require a study on its
own. That would also include the issue of the immediate influence of American cinema on
Yugoslav cinema, both on the filmmakers and on the audience; given that Hollywood conquered
Yugoslav cinema theatres expressly in the late 1940s, that line of research seems mandatory.
Before that study appears, however, I believe that it is safe to argue that the gender politics of
Yugoslav classic cinema was more influenced by Hollywood and other Western cinemas than by
some Zhdanovite-style imposed imperative of the socialist emancipation of women. It is not
surprising that Edmund Stillmen saw the happily nagging, fashion-obsessed (house)wives of the
nomenclature men – instead of, say, the nomenclature women or single working women – as one
of the key indices of Yugoslav modernity in accordance with the Western standards.
By developing and varying the labour-related gender asymmetry, the Yugoslav cinema
gradually gave up on the notion of work as an emancipating agency, especially with regard to the
women, who eventually vanished from the screen as the characters whose problem would make a
compelling film story. That vanishing had profound and long-lasting effects, as the woman
labourer will remain one of the rarest species of femininities in Yugoslav feature film in the
years to come.71 That goes for the novi film tendencies as well: although some important
modernist film in the 1960s and early 1970s did address the issue of labour and unemployment,
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most of them actually remained within the coordinates of the very same gender asymmetry.
71
It is very important to notice, as least in the footnote, that the documentary films showed more interest for the
vicissitudes of the working women. For example, Krešo Golik – who could (wrongly) appear as an anti-feminist in
light of the particular reading of his Blue 9 in this chapter –, has directed documentary Od 3 do 22/From 3 to 22
(1966), arguably the most harrowing testimony of the everyday routine of the working class woman provided by
Yugoslav cinema.
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Chapter 5
Confronting the rural patriarchy: Celluloid peasantry
from the monarchist to the socialist Yugoslavia
Yugoslav cinema always had a penchant for the countryside. The filmmakers’ interest in the
peasantry did not come out of the blue. From its very inception, after World War I, to its socialist
re-articulation, Yugoslavia was predominantly a rural country. Limited interwar modernization
did not substantially change the predominance of the farming population, and it was the
peasantry and not the urban proletariat that effectively carried out the antifascist struggle and the
socialist revolution in World War II. Rapid socialist modernization affected the Yugoslav
countryside in an unprecedented way, stirring up the massive transformation of the rural society
into an urban and industrial one. 72 The rapport of the peasantry and modernity provided the
filmmakers with a seemingly inexhaustible repertoire of plots and motifs, yielding many films
that designated its inner frictions and antagonisms.
The starting point of this chapter is the assumption that the filmmakers of the classical
period especially recognized the importance of the gender-related shifts in the modernization of
the countryside and peasantry. Moreover, I argue that the very central theme in virtually all of
these films is the change of the traditional rural gender order into a modern and emancipated one.
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Depending on the historical setting, we could more specifically argue that: (1) the films set in the
pre-revolutionary period screen the countryside primarily as the realm of the centuries-long
patriarchy that should be vanquished by the socialist emancipation; (2) the films set in the
socialist present tackle successes and the failures of that emancipating project. Accordingly, in
the first part of the chapter, I will analyze the films that are set in the monarchist Yugoslavia,
whereas, in the second part, I will tackle the socialism-set films.
Before proceeding, however, one point begs clarification in light of the previous chapter.
As we have seen, several of the construction films – Life is Ours, Lake, It Was Not In Vain – are
72
In what is the most extensive study on the Yugoslav countryside in English, Melissa K. Bokovoy (1998)
focuses on the communist project of collectivization, but also provides an account of the pre-war period.
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set in the village milieu and feature the peasant protagonists. Hence, undoubtedly, one should
take them in account when exploring the rural motifs in the Yugoslav cinema. However, I
decided to include them in the construction cycle because they unambiguously give an upper
hand to the imperative of reconstruction and modernization over the problems and impasses of
the Yugoslav peasantry in the post-war development. All three aforementioned films
unremittingly dispense with almost anything that could tarnish the beneficial effects of the
modernization on rural life. According to them, it suffices to debunk a scheme concocted by the
proverbial agents of the traditional oppression of the peasants (a kulak, a priest, or a sorceress),
convert the most stubborn village, and the hamlet would enter the socialist bliss as embodied in
the happy love couple. That way, those films alleviated the gender problems anchored in the
patriarchal rural tradition. In opposition to them, the peasant films that I analyze in this chapter
offer more intricate accounts of the rural patriarchal legacy.
5.1 .
Peasantry and gender in the interwar period-set films
Stories of classical films that designate the peasantry in The Kingdom of Yugoslavia, by rule,
unravel on a background of poverty that plagued the countryside in the interwar period. One does
not need to know much about the specificities of the “agrarian question” in the monarchist
Yugoslavia to understand the motif of the rural penury, but some elemental information helps.
According to the last inter-war census in 1931, peasantry made 76.5 percent of Yugoslav
population, whereas, in the underdeveloped parts of the country, this percentage was higher (e.g.
in Macedonia, the peasants made 90 percent of the population) (Woodward, 1995, p. 43). A
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major 1919 land reform paved the way for the gradual abolition of serfdom and disintegration of
the large landed estates, making the land belong to those who tilled it. However, the state
actively privileged the industrial growth at the expense of the agrarian sector: since “a
disproportionate share of the increase in income went to the industrial sector and to the towns, [...]
there was probably little, if any, reduction in the absolute numbers of those living in extreme
poverty in the more backward rural areas of the country” (Dubey, 1975, p. 24). According to
Woodward, after the farm prices globally decreased in the late 1920s and the domestic demand
declined in the 1930s, the penury of the farming population culminated in “widespread
malnutrition bordering on starvation [that] hit all areas of the country” (p. 44, fn. 46).
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The classic films used this extreme poverty as canvas on which they painted the dynamic
of the patriarchal exploitation. Due to the inter-war setting, these films could be seen as
symptoms in the psychoanalytical sense of the term, for they combined the incongruous
tendencies. On the one hand, the films criticized The Kingdom of Yugoslavia as a political and
ideological system that is radically different from the socialist Yugoslavia – indeed, it is a
negation in more ways than one. At the same time, however, the films emphasized that the
historical and social past, which they criticized, is relatively a recent one; consequently, some of
its integral aspects might have survived the revolution and spilled over in the socialist today. The
rural patriarchal tradition appeared to be such a remainder. The films criticized it as a part and
parcel of the dead epoch, but also connoted that it might still be quite alive. By underlining this
fact, these films functioned as the corrective to the village-set construction films, which screened
the socialist pastoral from which the electrification and the romantic happy endings purged the
last ugly remains of the patriarchy.73
5.1.1. Stone Horizons
Having for the main protagonist a peasant girl who moves to a town in a search for a job, Kameni
horizonti/Stone Horizons (1953, Šime Šimatović) tackled the issue of gender dimension of the
economic migration from the countryside to the urban zones – the phenomenon that will
radically escalate in the socialist period as the main precondition of the Yugoslav
industrialization and urbanization. The film connotes the poverty and harshness of the prewar
peasant life with its title already. It is set in Dalmatinska Zagora, an exemplary karst region: a
craggy wilderness with a dearth of water and fertile soil is the key topos of barrenness and
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penury in Yugoslav cinema. Of all natural vistas in Yugoslav cinema, the inert, arid karst
expanses – Istria, Dalmatia, Zagora, Herzegovina, Montenegro, Kosovo, and Macedonia –
provide the most primordial, seemingly eternal landscape in which both the Nature and the
Human are stripped to their elements; hence, Tomislav Šakić’s notion of the “rocky terrain
chronotope [kronotop kamenjara]” (2004, p. 18).74
73
Out of the four films set in the inter-war Yugoslavia with the peasant protagonists, I do not analyze only the
omnibus Tri zgodbe/Three Stories (1955, Jane Kavčič, Igor Pretnar, France Kosmač), as it remained beyond my
reach. The film features bleak episodes from the peasant life from the early 20th century in the Slovene countryside,
all connected with the motif of water (Furlan et al., 1994, pp. 42–43).
74
That karst setting also attracted international filmmakers, as testified by the cycle of the Karl May westerns
produced by the West German company Rialto in the 1960s. Due to the idiosyncratic quality of the karst landscape,
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In 1940, the peasant girl Mala is forced to leave her rocky hamlet for Trogir, a small town
on the Adriatic coast. In order to pay the family debt, her father, the old peasant Jakov, takes her
to work as a maid in the household of Roko, a rich peasant who is in the olive oil business.
Although her boss unexpectedly dies relatively soon after her arrival, Mala nevertheless
experiences the deprivation, both by Roko and his wife. Aware that Roko’s widow will not stand
her in the house after her husband’s death, Mala heads to town where she is found by Bude
Amerikanac, a former émigré from the US, who is looking for a waitress for his tavern. Very
soon Bude discovers that she is too keen and emphatic to work in such an environment, and fires
her. Mala manages to find a new job as a housemaid in an upper-class household, first for
signore Kaputić and then for the lecherous count Alberto. Losing track of his daughter, Jakov
starts working in the Trogir shipbuilding, where he commits suicide by drowning. Mala
reappears and mourns the loss of her father and her own misfortunate position, but one of their
friends, who is himself a peasant employed in the shipyard, pledges that the other workers stand
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by her.
FIGURE 5.1–2 The ending of Stone Horizons
The finale of Stone Horizons is socialist realism at its purest: hundred-odd laborers from the
shipbuilding swarm around Mala in what was supposed to be a paramount display of proletarian
solidarity. However, the scene misfires as it aggressively erases the girl’s already fragile agency
and her bodily presence (FIGURE 5.1–2). That being said, the blatant socialist-realist ending
these westerns do not operate as mere imitation of the American western: “the landscape that Der Schatz im
Silbersee constructs is less the authentic representation of a real America than a condensed image of a European idea
of the Wild West” (Bergfelder, 2005, p. 187).
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should not distract us from the fact that the rest of the film does not designate the prewar trials
and tribulations of the peasantry in an overtly didactic way: before ushering the socialist realism
in its finale, the film alloys social realism, neorealism, and “some instinctive folklore realism”
(Šakić, 2004, p. 19).
The best example of the film’s betrayal of the socialist-realist principles is the striking
absence of the positive assertive hero, whose revolutionary activities would make the main story
of the film. At its very beginning, the film appears to feature such a protagonist: Bane, the
peasant boy who became the factory worker who returns to the hamlet. Early scenes define him
as the man of the revolutionary action: in the first dialogue, he explains that he is on the run from
the gendarmerie for organizing a strike. However, the moment Mala appears, Bane gets relegated
to an episode.
Mala also does not fit the profile of the assertive revolutionary heroine. Not only is she a
far cry from the cheerful and restless Slavica (although Irena Kolesar played both roles), but
turns out to be less active than Vera in Immortal Youth, and Marija in The Flag, who are, at first,
the ideological tabulae rasae, unaware of the revolutionary Cause, however gradually discover
and embrace it. Also, unlike Vera and Marija, Mala does not fall in love with the active hero
through whom she would develop a revolutionary attachment; the film stops short of establishing
her conventional – indeed, almost obligatory – coupling with Bane.75 In addition to this, whereas
the partisan girls lose their romantic partners and thus sublimate their love into the ultimate
commitment to the revolution, Mala’s final loss is the death of the father who did not die in an
act of revolutionary defiance, but, quite the contrary, killed himself precisely because of lack of
it.
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The film also belies the socialist-realist pattern by introducing another supporting
character who stands as Bane’s ideological opponent but is not his villainous adversary. It is
Martin, a vagrant and petty thief, who meets Mala two times (in a telling coincidence, just like
Bane). His jovial appearance hides a disillusioned soul. A man of peasant origins as well, he
leaves for the city in search of a job. After realizing that no wage could possibly save his family
from poverty, he severed a contact with them, gave up on looking for a job, and became a bird of
passage. According to Martin, everyone lives either as a wolf or as a lamb: “Destiny determined
75
The lack of romance is atypical for a 1953 film, especially in case of an attractive actress such as Kolesar. In
all of her previous roles – as Slavica, Zorica in Immortal Youth, and Nena in Blue 9 – she played the girls in love, as
she will proceed to do so in all of her major cinema roles from the 1950s (The Last Track, I Will Be Back).
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me to be the lamb, but I found a way not to be eaten by the wolves. It may not be fully honest
and those who want can resent me for it… Why don’t they give me work to do I don’t want to
starve to death, but I don’t want the gendarmes to beat me either. That takes courage ... [Sudbina
je odredila da budem janje, a ja sam izmislio način da me vuci ne pojedu. Možda nije sasvim
pošten, neka mi zamjeri ko hoće... Zašto mi ne daju posla? Ja neću da umrem od gladi, a neću ni
da me žandari prebiju. Za to treba hrabrosti...]” This tacit acknowledgement of an ordinary
human weakness challenges the notion of revolutionary heroism more than any outright anticommunist attack would do.76
However, although the film acknowledges the importance of a worldview that contrasts
the revolutionary one, it stops short of attaching it to Mala. In that sense, I would disagree with
the argument that it is Martin and not Bane who entices Mala’s moral transformation (Šakić,
2004, p. 19). As a matter of fact, the film does not show any substantial change of her worldview:
Mala does not make any significant act that would testify to her adoption of either Bane’s or
Martin’s lessons. In the last segment of the film, she is seen crying over her dead father’s body –
something that she would presumably do anyway – and eventually gets surrounded-andconcealed by the supportive workers, but does not have the opportunity to act.
Instead of romantically and ideologically attaching Mala to either Bane or Martin, the
film prefers to keep her unbounded and sets her to roam from one social niche to another. That
way, it screens something that was obfuscated in the socialist-realist representation of the prewar capitalist exploitation in the previous films. Whereas the films like Slavica or Major Bauk
(1951, Nikola Popović), privileged industry as the paradigmatic arena of capitalist abuse and
proletarian resistance, Stone Horizons reveal that the exploitation extended far beyond the
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factory and targeted much more numerous and diverse socio-economic subjects than the
industrial workforce. As Mala’s search for a job illustrates, the infra-industrial exploitation also
encompassed the low-class women, many of them peasants, who did not need to enter the factory
gates to become disempowered. By entering the middle and upper-class households, the peasant
and underclass women would wind up as the maltreated and underpaid handmaids, waitresses,
and, it went without saying, “white slaves”. Thus, contrary to a view that sees Mala’s trajectory
as the standard socialist-realist display of the class divide (Šakić, 2004), the string of her
76
The film appears to have a sort of pro-Martin bias: Martin has more screen time and dialogue than Bane, and is
played by Antun Nalis, one of the most popular actors of the period; Bane was the debut act for Boris Tešija, who
will remain remembered more as a film editor than as a thespian.
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employments reveals the niches of exploitation in a way that is quite atypical if compared with
the previous socialist-realist films.
It is hard to miss the gender aspect of this infra-industrial exploitation and its disclosure.
By opting for the female protagonist, Stone Horizons does not merely argue that the women were
more vulnerable, as such, to exploitation then the men, but reveals that they were exploited
differently and with different outcomes. Bane’s story reveals that the male workers in the
industrial setting could easily get killed due to the inhumane working conditions; on the other
hand, the film shows that the sexual abuse, which was integral to the exploitation of the women,
would often lead to pregnancy of the wretched woman.77 This gender difference might point as
to why this type of exploitation remained under the socialist-realist radar in the previous film: the
stories of heroic resistance of the brave factory workers organized in syndicates and party cells,
cast a long shadow over the ordeals of the disenfranchised women who roamed the grey,
unprotected zone that was not designated as integral for the political resistance. Out of industry,
out of the grand revolutionary narrative: the revolution was to be conducted by dominantly male
factory workers, not by maids and waitresses.
The film is adamant that the underclass, peasant woman is the ultimate social pariah. In
comparison to Mala, even Martin boasts the gender privilege. Although it seems that, as a
vagrant, he is at the very social bottom, in both of his scenes with Mala she literally has to serve
him (first in the tavern, later at the ball). Moreover, in the first scene, Martin recklessly
contributes to her exploitation: after he sneaks away from the tavern without paying his lunch,
the owner holds Mala responsible, slaps her, and decides that the stolen lunch be deducted from
her wages. In light of Bane’s and Martin’s male privilege, then, the ideological opposition
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between them appears ultimately insignificant from Mala’s vantage: that could be the main
reason why she does not choose either of their strategies.
But how should we describe Mala’s position, then? Let me try by referring to
Koncert/Concert (1954, Branko Belan), a film which significantly differs from Stone Horizons in
terms of style, and yet, share some thematic traits that are worth exploring. Concert opens in
1945, in the postwar Zagreb, when a group of young people invites Ema, an old wretched
woman and former piano teacher, to play the piano that they got. The story then returns to the
77
One such girl returns to Mala’s village. Not only that she will give birth to another human being, which
requires food and others sorts of goods and care, but she also loses her honor and possibility to find a husband in the
rural community.
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past in four flashback segments that make most of the film. The first one is set in 1914 (on the
day of assassination of Franz Ferdinand no less!), the second and the third one are set in the
monarchist Yugoslavia, in 1922 and 1929 respectively, whereas the fourth one is set in 1941;
finally, the film returns to the postwar framing story. Every retrospective segment renders an
episode in the life of Ema, starting from her childhood in 1914. All these episodes elaborate the
antagonistic relation between Ema, the working-class girl (her mother is a cleaning woman), and
the upper-class family of baron Glojzner. Due to the Glojzners’ malevolent influence, Ema
gradually loses her integrity: she gets crippled, loses the man she loves, remains unrealized as a
pianist, turns to alcohol... Even though she is present in each and every segment of the film, she
does not occupy the standard position of the main, active protagonist. In a way, she has the
paradoxical status of an episodic character in her own life, remaining in the shadow of the grand
familial narrative of the Glojzners, which dramatically registers the historical shifts and breaks.
Already, this sketch indicates how complex and ambitious work Concert was, especially
given its production context. 78 However, here, I will only tackle the similarity between the
paths/positions of Mala and Ema. Both women embody the link between the disfranchisement of
an under-class woman and the certain subjective inertia on her side. Concert radically dramatizes
this relation: Ema eventually collapses in a nervous (existentialist) breakdown, as if realizing that
her loss is irrecoverable even in the new, socialist era (FIGURE 5.3–4). According to Nenad
Polimac (1976), that incurable breakdown stands the fatal eruption of pessimism that was utterly
at odds with the dominant ideology of that time.
Although Stone Horizons might be inferior to Concert in many ways, Mala paves the way
for Ema, as it were. Due to her class inferiority she also lives a life shaped by the forces out of
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her control; also, she is hardly assertive or prone to positive action. It is hardly a coincidence that
the endings of both films feature a group of supportive revolutionaries who surround the hapless
female protagonist, persuading her to embrace the revolutionary change as the one that will
finally heal all of her traumas.
78
Back in 1954, the film met with generally unfavorable critical reception, but the new generation of critics
thoroughly revalorized it in the mid-1970s, praising is as the greatest film of the early 1950s (Polimac, 1976;
Jurdana, Tadić and Turković, 1977). For an exhaustive account of this radical turn in the film’s reception, see
Turković (2005).
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FIGURE 5.3–4 Ema’s breakdown in the finale of Concert
Apparently, Ema’s breakdown overtly defies that recuperation scenario (FIGURE 5.4), as the
revolutionary group remains at a distance from her. However, the shoddy closure of Stone
Horizons can be seen as a desperate and ultimately failed attempt to hide the fact that Mala, just
like Ema, cannot be integrated into the socialist-realist prospect of modernity. She could easily
scream and collapse just as Ema does, but we could not hear and see that because of the mass of
active male revolutionaries that surrounds her. The fact that Concert offered a much more
refined variant of Mala’s experience only one year after Stone Horizons, testifies to the exquisite
dynamic of the withering away of the socialist-realist mold in Yugoslav cinema.
5.1.2. The Girl and the Oak
Djevojka i hrast/The Girl and the Oak (1955, Krešo Golik) is a coming-of-age story of Smilja,
the titular protagonist, who lives in a nondescript hamlet in Zagora. When her mother dies, the
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girl of five becomes an orphan; after some time a sow severely grips and cripples her right fist.
Most of the villagers deem Smilja as a jinx, and her foster father Roko uses every opportunity to
accuse her of bringing misery upon his house. And yet, the handicap and the prejudices do not
matter much to the three young men infatuated with the girl’s beauty. Josip is Roko’s brutish son,
fiercely jealous at any other boy who approaches Smilja. Appalled by his cruel nature, Smilja
turns to Ivan, a gentle, sensitive, and educated boy, who expresses his feelings for Smilja by
teaching her to read and write. However, the prospect of their romantic bliss is doomed, as Ivan
is terminally ill from tuberculosis. The third young man is Bojan, a nomadic basket weaver who
is an orphan himself. Unlike Josip the Demon and Ivan the Saint, he is all too human, as testified
both by his genuine care for the girl and a lack of prudishness. When Josip finds out that Smilja
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plans to leave with Ivan, he murders his rival and rapes the girl. Since the patriarchal tradition of
blood law obliges Ivan’s brothers to avenge him, Josip hides from them in the karst. Accusing
Smilja of his son’s misfortune, Roko throws her out, so she returns to the dilapidated house that
belonged to her mother. Fleeting from Ivan’s brothers, Josip seeks refuge at Smilja’s place, but
Bojan intervenes and the criminal returns to karst where the persecutors eventually track him
down and kill him. The end of the film shows Smilja with her newborn son. She is prematurely
gray, yet her face expresses serenity, and maternal bliss.
As the synopsis indicates, The Girl and the Oak most certainly address the hardships of
the peasant woman, but in a decidedly different way than Stone Horizons. Not only does the film
not utilize the notion of capitalist exploitation and class conflict, but it drastically erases
references to modernity in general, creating an impression that the film is set earlier in the past. 79
That way, The Girl and the Oak aligns itself with a cycle of classical historical melodramas set
in the pre-Yugoslav epoch, featuring the central female protagonist who challenges and
destabilizes her social milieu: Sofka (1948, Radoš Novaković), Ciganka/Gypsy Girl (1953,
Vojislav Nanović), Anikina vremena/Anika’s Times (1954, Vladimir Pogačić), Pjesma sa
Kumbare/The Song from Kumbara (1955, Radoš Novaković), and Hanka (1955, Slavko
Vorkapić); and, somewhat atypical within this batch, Nevjera/Shame (1953, Vladimir Pogačić).
These historical melodramas most certainly were cautionary tales about the women’s
socio-economic disenfranchisement in the pre-modern era, when the patriarchal norms and
customs blatantly subjugated women to the male privilege. However, there was more to these
films than the anti-patriarchal pedagogy. Its differentia specifica was the way it tackled romance
and sexuality. As we have seen in the previous chapters, the romantic happy ending was the
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norm in the socialist-set films, whereas the WWII-set films foregrounded the tragic ending with
at least one lover dying by the fascist hand. The historical melodramas, however, introduced in
Yugoslav cinema the notion of love as inextricably linked to irrationality, pain, and all sorts of
excessive passions. They showed that love, far from being a beautiful emotion only, derails us
profoundly, and often irreversibly. Whereas the tragic endings in the partisan films were the
result of the external agency that obliterates the couple that is genuinely in love, the tragic
endings in the historical melodramas illustrated that there is something within love itself, as it
79
The mise-en-scène does not feature any prominent trace of modernity. Only two breadcrumbs suggest the
interwar period: Bojan mentions an airplane, and the fact that the peasants are in possession of their land connotes
the post-1919 setting.
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were, that aims to demise and destruction. Love is not a precious fragile thing anymore that
needs to be protected from the outside danger, but a clock-work device that hides the ultimate
danger in its very core. In that regard, historical melodrama was substantially at odds with the
dominant romantic fiction of socialist realism.
It is easy to see how The Girl and the Oak fits this profile. First, it zeroes in on the
women’s ordeal in the traditional rural community. Its very first shot shows a row of women clad
in black as they slowly walk across the hellish, sun-burnt landscape. As the credits roll, we see
these faceless beings as they, in the Sisyphean effort, slowly walk away, their backs bending
under the heavy wooden barrels. The male voiceover narrates: “This is my native land: the rocks
and the cracked earth. During the summer, when the rainwater supplies dry up, the women walk
to the remote well in the cliffs for hours. In our village, they call it the Calvary [Ovo je moj kraj:
kamen i raspucala zemlja. Ljeti kada presuše zalihe kišnice, žene satima pješače do dalekog
izvora u litici. U našem selu to zovu Križnim putem]” (FIGURE 5.5–6). The last woman in the
row – Smilja’s mother – is lagging, falling behind and falling, and dies soon afterwards, there, in
the karst, exhausted from hunger, thirst and the heavy wooden barrels. Smilja’s own personal
history is also one of female hardship and suffering.
The film also offers a whirlwind of amorous, but also dark passions, the most daunting of
them is Josip’s demonic obsession with Smilja, which drives him to commit murder and rape.
One should not forget that Smilja is the first main female protagonist in Yugoslav cinema that
suffered sexual violation. The film does not restrain from staging the rape, designating it with a
series of shots of Josip throwing himself on Smilja and dragging her to the ground, leaving the
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most obnoxious part of the crime off screen.
FIGURE 5.5–6 Calvary in The Girl and the Oak
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Important as these similarities are, they should not distract us from the equally important
differences between The Girl and the Oak and other historical melodramas. The most obvious
one is the different type of closure. The melodramas’ tragic endings find their female
protagonists unambiguously crushed by the patriarchal values and norms: they either end up in a
loveless marriage, or murdered. The Girl and the Oak, however, illustrates that there are other
options for the women other than death and marriage; I will return to its ending in due time. Now,
I would like to stress the difference regarding the most notable trait of the sexually charged
universe of the historical melodramas: eroticization of the female body. In the time when bodies
in the rest of Yugoslav cinema were carefully kept in check, represented as chaste and virtually
asexual (unless, of course, they belonged to the debauched villains), the historical melodramas
short-circuited corporeality and sexuality. Hence, from one film to another, the female body was
gradually eroticized by means of different, constantly developing strategies of representation that
foremost included denuding. The first step in denuding of the woman is found in Sofka, the very
first Yugoslav historical film. The titular beauty, who drives men insane, visits the women’s
hamam (the public bath), and, as she takes off her clothes and rejoices in the bathing, the camera
does not focus on her body, but on her curvaceous and arousing shadow on the wall. In The
Gypsy Girl, the titular protagonist Koštana performs a seductive belly dance, wearing a
translucent shirt that covers-yet-reveals her breasts. In Hanka, when the titular beauty, another
fatal Gypsy, gets murdered by her jealous lover, her body ends up on the autopsy: the viewers
can see a nipple for the first time uncovered (at least partially) in Yugoslav cinema (FIGURE 5.7–
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9).80
80
That the first bare nipple in Yugoslav cinema belongs to a dead woman can be seen as the symptomatic
compromise of the two opposed impulses: to finally reveal the nipple and to contain excessive effect of that move.
The haunting presence of death permeates the next case of denuding, which is, to the best of my knowledge, the first
one in a WWII-set film. In Don’t Turn Around, Son (1956), a woman painting model flashes the viewers with her
breast in a blink-and-you-will-miss-it moment. However, the gloomy context defuses the titillating potential of the
scene: the painter is a Jew, whom we already deem virtually dead as the ustaša forces might enter his studio and take
him to the concentration camp at any moment; the woman herself is a deaf-mute who does modeling to make ends
meet in the midst of the wartime penury.
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FIGURE 5.7–9 The gradual denuding of the female body from Sofka (1948),
to Gypsy Woman (1953), to Hanka (1954)
Set in Serbia and Bosnia during the Ottoman rule or shortly after that, those historical
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melodramas screen eroticism by pertaining to “[t]he phantasm of Oriental sexuality, with its lure
of boundless pleasure and perennial lasciviousness” (Behdad, 1999, p. 68). 81 In a curiously
neglected paradox, then, erotica in early Yugoslav socialist modernity thrives on the Orientalist
imaginary that originated from the literature of the pre-socialist or sometimes even pre-Yugoslav
epoch: Sofka and Gypsy Girl are based on Bora Stanković’s novel Impure Blood (1910) and the
play Koštana (1902), respectively; Ivo Andrić’s novella Anika’s Time and Isak Samokovlija’s
play Hanka, both published in 1931, were adapted into the eponymous historical melodramas. It
81
Exception to this is Shame, set in south Dalmatia, i.e. outside the Ottoman influence. It also differs from the
rest of the cycle with having a both happy and tragic ending, as it intertwines the stories of the two couples with
radically different outcomes.
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is not for nothing that Vicko Raspor labeled these sub-genre the “shalwar films [šalvarski filmovi]”
(1988, p. 107), after the women’s loose trousers made of silk or cotton, one of the most
emblematic Oriental garments. Hence, the central figure of this socialist-Orientalist imaginary is
a girl or a woman, graced with the irresistible beauty and irrepressible pride. Not only does she
express her vitality and passion through song, dance, or even promiscuity, but she is not afraid to
do so in public, perfectly aware of the shattering effects that her oozing eroticism has on the men
surrounding her. She does not only incarnate the sexual, but also the ethnic other: she is a Gypsy
(as Koštana and Hanka), comes from an inter-ethnic wedlock (as Zehra, a half Serb-half Turk, in
Song from Kumbara), or does not restrain from having affairs with the members of the “other”
ethno-religious group (like Anika). Needless to say, just like with any other representation of
sexuality, it would be dangerous to limit the meaning and effects of these images. Instead of
idealizing them as overtly liberating, or besmirching them as the downright exploitative, we
ought to stay attentive for the antagonistic relation between these two aspects.
And yet, Smilja is a far cry from the erotic Oriental femininity. At first, it is
understandable as the world of The Girl and the Oak is untouched by the actual Ottoman
influences, but remains firmly Christian, as illustrated by the streak of religious symbols running
through the film (Calvary, the opposition between Josip and Ivan, an old woman petrified in the
eternal prayer, the massive crosses – FIGURE 5.10–11). In its most flamboyant erotic moment,
Bojan reaches for Smilja’s breast, teasing her as she is hanging up the clothes to dry; this
moment is rendered through a play of shadows (FIGURE 5.12) – a rather timid image when
compared to the racy shots of Hanka or Anika’s Times. Unlike the seductive but proud Oriental
beauties, Smilja is chaste, meek, and decidedly de-eroticized.
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The main strategy of the film contains the body and sexuality by using one more strategy:
by emphasizing the landscape. Following Martin Lefebvre (2006), I use the term “landscape”
here as contrasted to “setting”: e.g. the karst in Stone Horizons is not more than a setting, as it
conventionally operates as a backdrop for the action, whereas the karst in The Girl and the Oak
functions as a proper landscape since it does not serve as supportive scenery, i.e. it is not
“subordinated to eventhood” (Lefebvre, 2006, p. 28). The karst ambient explodes into the
seemingly never-ending series of open, vast landscapes, at the same time unbearable in its desertlike harshness and stunning in its beauty. One could quip that the story in The Girl and the Oak
is just an excuse for creating the natural landscapes of sublime quality.
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FIGURE 5.10–11 Christian symbols in The Girl and the Oak
FIGURE 5.12 Bojan reaches for Smilja’s breast
The contradiction between the human body and the landscape is mediated by the rich visuals
which Golik himself describes as influenced by Eisenstein and expressionism, whereas some
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critics also recognized the more contemporary influence from the work of Gabriel Figueroa
(Jurdana, Polimac and Zubčević, 1975; Škrabalo 1984, p. 169). The film incessantly uses
stylized framing and mise-en-scène, which were atypical for Yugoslav cinema at the time:
symmetrical compositions, canted framing, and subjective camera (FIGURE 5.13–16). These
formal devices are integral to the contradiction between the body and the landscape. The tension
between the two is maintained by numerous shots in which they apparently cannot coexist. The
extreme long shots of the karst wilderness diminish human figures, often reducing them to blots
on the horizon (FIGURE 5.17–18). On the other side, the most expressive representations of the
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human body are the close ups and the extreme close ups of the face, which often dismisses the
natural background or, apparently, the diegetic space altogether (FIGURE 5.19–20).
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FIGURE 5.13–16 The stylized framing and the mise-en-scène
FIGURE 5.17–18 The human figures diminished by the landscape
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FIGURE 5.19–20 The extreme close-ups
FIGURE 5.21–22 Smilja as Madonna
The closest that The Girl and the Oak comes to a sort of reconciliation between the body and the
landscape, is the titular combination of Smilja and her pet tree, the oak that she has been
watering and keeping from being cut down, ever since her childhood. The fact that she irrigated
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the tree for the first time with the water from her death mother’s barrel, establishes a symbolic
filial relation between them, and invites the notion of the everlasting bond between the absent
(dead) mother and the orphan daughter, most famously illustrated with the fairytale about
Cinderella (Warner, 1995, pp. 201–217). Of course, by the end of the film, Mila has become a
mother herself. The final shot places her in the shadow of the tree, as she tenderly holds the baby
in her arms: the place of her mother’s death turns into the place where Smilja, as a mother,
celebrates life. Relying on Christian imaginary, The Girl and the Oak equates motherhood with
virtue and sacrifice: from the opening shots of Smilja’s mother dying on Calvary, to the final
shots of Smilja herself, shaped after Madonna with the child (FIGURE 5.21–22), the film makes a
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full circle in its celebration of motherhood as the supreme agency that appears to resolve the very
antagonism between the Society and the Nature. At the same time, however, one should not
underestimate its effects within the social field alone, with regard to quotidian problems such as
the out-of-wedlock pregnancy: in the gender regime of the pre-war patriarchy, a woman would
be effectively ousted from her rural community due to problems like these.
At first, thus, it seems that the film ends on a relatively high note: even a pinch of
melancholy does not challenge Smilja’s maternal bliss. However, a closer look reveals that the
closure, nevertheless, relies on masculinity and patriarchy. Excluded from the field of vision, the
male agency returns through sound, in the male voiceover who solemnly concludes: “The
women from my motherland bloom quickly and wilt quickly. If they experience even a moment
of happiness, they become endeared and hide their tear in embarrassment [Žene u mom kraju
brzo cvatu i brzo venu. Ako dožive časak sreće, raznježe se i stidno skriju suzu].” True, the voice
belongs to the righteous peasant who is most responsible for reintegrating Smilja into the village
community; and yet, it serves to remind us that the whole story of Smilja is articulated from the
privileged male vantage. As such, in a deep contradiction, it readily acknowledges the most
heinous aspects of the traditional patriarchy, but eventually does not challenge its master status.
5.1.3. Master of One’s Own Body
Unlike the previous two films, Svoga tijela gospodar/Master of One’s Own Body (1957, Fedor
Hanžeković) is not set in the arid and rocky Zagora but in Zagorje, the fertile and lush region in
northern Croatia, which will entail arguably the archetypical pastoral in the classic Yugoslav
cinema. The pastures abundant in catlle, peasants who work in the field, or frolic in the hay, are
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the representations apparently incongruent with the scarcity of the karst setting. And yet, the air
of penury informs the film: after the sudden death of his only cow, the peasant Jakov decides to
marry his adolescent son Iva in order to get a new cow as part of the dowry. The fear of poverty
thus paves the way for the arranged marriage between the handsome and careless womanizer Iva,
and Roža, an unattractive limp from a rich peasant family. 82 Iva is disgusted by his bride, and the
wedding turns into a farce: a shot of Roža, sitting alone by the table, in an empty room,
anticipates the marital misfortune, as Iva refuses to sleep with her, let alone have sex. Roža tries
82
Like Bude Amerikanac in Stone Horizons, Roža’s father was an economic migrant in the US, where he made
enough of money to return to Yugoslavia and rise above the poverty threshold.
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her best to please and seduce her husband, but to no avail. Iva keeps spending his nights with
Jaga, a local voluptuous widow, notorious for her promiscuity, until Jakov decides to stop it, and
takes his son’s place in the widow’s bed. The film’s finale takes place at the wedding banquet of
Rosa’s young sister. Whilst Iva stares at the attractive bride, Rosa puts some magic dust into his
vine, which she got from the local sorceress. Iva catches her red-handed, and starts beating her.
To his surprise, Roža starts demanding him to hit her more, saying that it is the only way for her
to feel the touch of her husband. Perplexed, Iva stops beating her. He leaves the feast, and Roža
follows him.
Both of Hanžeković’s previous feature films – Monk Brne’s Pupil (1951), and Stojan
Mutikaša (1954) – were set in the second half of the 19th century. Adapted from the eponymous
historical novels published in 1892 and 1907 by Simo Matavulj and Svetozar Ćorović
respectively, those two films serve as an interesting gender counterpoint to the historical
melodramas analyzed in the previous subchapter. Whereas the heroines of the historical
melodramas were driven by passion, Hanžeković’s films boasted the male protagonist plagued
by social ambition: a peasant boy by origin, he becomes a social climber, who gives up on his
innocent childhood dreams and sinks deep into greed and corruption. That way, his life path
reveals the crookedness inherent to the dominant social norms in the pre-socialist past: in Monk
Brne’s Pupil, the clergy preaches humbleness and renunciation, whereas, at the same time, it
excels in privilege and effectively exploits the peasantry; in Stojan Mutikaša, the trade is a thinly
veiled theft. Hence the crucial gender difference in the historical melodramas: the heroines get
punished for disrespecting the social norms, whereas the male anti-heroes get punished for
clinging to the social norms too hard. The key element in designating this difference is love: the
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women transgress the social norms in the name of love, whereas the men give up on love so they
could climb up the social hierarchy.83
Adapted from a more contemporary literary source – Slavko Kolar, the famous social
realist writer, penned the script after his own story – Master of One’s Own Body entails a far
more complex story than the novels of Matavulj and Ćorović. To begin with, the main male
protagonist is a far cry from the overambitious protagonists of the previous Hanžeković’s films.
83
One of the conventions of the genre is the man’s choice between true love, usually the poor girl whom he met
during his days of innocence, and the pragmatic romance, by rule, with a rich widow or married-yet-unloved wife,
who is significantly older than the hero yet still sexually active and desirable. In a proper Oedipal pattern, the
romance with this matronly lover marks the point of no return in the anti-hero’s demise. The characters of the
wealthy women that Mira Stupica played in Stojan Mutikaša and Hanka are exemplary of this figure.
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Lazy and irresponsible, Iva certainly overestimates himself, and thus can be seen as an
embodiment of the male hubris, but he is never guilty of excessive aspirations. It is the simple
carnal pleasures that guide him, not the long-term plans of a social climber.
In another remarkable difference, Master of One’s Own Body is Hanžeković’s first film
with such a prominent and multilayered female protagonist. Roža is not only the heart of the film,
but also an exercise in representation that was unprecedented in Yugoslav cinema: for the first
time, a filmmaker decidedly opted for an unattractive girl as the central protagonist, inviting the
audience to identify and empathize with her. Comparison with The Girl and the Oak is
instructive. Whereas Smilja’s beauty is hardly tainted even with her bodily handicap, Roža
makes for a truly unsightly appearance, her lame walk only adding insult to injury. Most
importantly, whereas Golik neutralizes Smilja’s sexuality by transforming her beauty into the
sublime, Hanžeković dared to eroticizes his crippled heroine. In one of the crucial scenes, the
forester spots Roža alone in the woods, and tries to rape her, to which she fiercely and
successfully resists. Pulling herself together, Roža realizes that the attack – as horrendous as it
was – testifies that she is desirable nevertheless: even a crippled body possesses an erotic
capacity (FIGURE 5.23–24). The same shot graced the poster of the film, inviting the audience to
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desire the deformed, yet, erotic woman.
FIGURE 5.23–24 Roža discovers her own eroticism in Master of One’s Own Body
Serving as a crucial distinction from the heroines of the historical melodramas, Roža does not
perceive her desire to love and be loved as incongruent to social norms. Instead of confronting
the patriarchal law head on, through denial or ridicule, she does the opposite: she demands that
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law must be fully implemented – if she has become Iva’s wife, then he must treat her accordingly.
As Slavoj Žižek would have it, she over-identifies with the patriarchal law and thus reveals its
major problems even more, and challenges it: “an ideological edifice can be undermined by a
too-literal identification [...] Is not an exemplary case of such a subversion-through-identification
provided by Jaroslav Hasek’s The Good Soldier Schweik, the novel whose hero wreaks total
havoc by simply executing the orders of his superiors in an overzealous and all-too-literal way?”
(2008, p. 29).
Two scenes aptly illustrate how Roža’s overzealous insistence reveals the insufficiency
of the patriarchal law and the pre-socialist rural gender order: her visits to the priest and to the
sorceress. The difference between these two instances is clear: the priest stands for the official
matrimonial law,84 whereas the witch represents the tradition of the unwritten norms and customs;
the manner in which these two registers are gendered is also a telltale. And yet, the scenes reveal
that the two are effectively one and the same. In a pronounced parallel, both the priest and the
witch require to be paid for their services: both scenes end with the camera focusing on the
money Roža is paying them. Equally important is that both of them remain outside our field of
vision, as we only hear their voice – the voice as the ultimate medium of the law, both official
and unwritten (Dolar, 2006). In the most substantial mirroring of all, both the priest and the
witch ask Rože the very same questions (“Does your husband beat you? Does he curse upon
you?”), as if domestic violence is the only marital problem worthy of an intervention. Roža
responds that her husband does not beat her, but she does not believe that the lack of violence
equates good marriage; apparently, there must be something more to it. In a case of cruel irony,
however, the issue of marital violence reappears in the final scene when Ive slaps Roža after
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debunking her “sorcery”, to which she responds with an outcry: “Hit me! Hit me, dear little Iva,
let your fist at least show me that I am your wife! [Udri! Udri, mili Ivek, nek bar po šaki tvojoj znam
da sam ti žena!]” Enraged, Iva raises his hand to hit Roža again, but then instantly stands petrified,
as if himself being struck by a new insight. However, what thoughts and feelings did exactly
cross his mind remains an enigma: did he realize how unfounded and misguided was his scorn
for Roža?; to what effect would that sudden knowledge entail?; did he recognize his wife’s
beauty?; his own disenfranchisement?; all of these, or – none? Roža’s own thoughts and
emotions are equally unclear: was her outcry sarcastic and defiant, or does she really
84
As emphasized in Introduction, in the monarchist Yugoslavia matrimony was in jurisdiction of the churches.
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masochistically desire Iva’s touch and recognition at any cost? When Iva and Roža walk away,
up the hill, in the closing shot, this massive uncertainty persists. Hence, although the film
stylistically does not meet the standards set by the most innovative contemporary work in classic
Yugoslav cinema, the radical openness of its closing, makes Master of One’s Own Body
genuinely proto-modern.
However, this does not mean that the film is vague or inconclusive in its criticism of the
patriarchy. Let me illustrate that by tackling the titular phrase: who exactly is the “master of
one’s own body”? To be sure, the film puts that phrase in Iva’s mouth. He defiantly shouts it
when his parents force him to marry the girl whom he detests; that way, he demonstrates that he
does not want to renounce his carnal freedom (his affair with Jaga) for the sake of traditional
norms. However, paradoxically, the very affair with the seductive widow is the paramount
evidence that Iva is actually a slave of his own body. Indeed, the misfortune that befell him and
Roža, stems for his inability to control his sexual urge: while he was looking after his cow, he
could not resist Jaga’s invitation for pastoral sex,and while they were rolling in the hay, the cow
ate the very four-leaf clover that caused her death!. The fact that later on in the film Jakov also
falls for Jaga’s charms, only cements the impression that men are hardly masters of their own
bodies.
In opposition to men, women appear to be more in control of their own bodies. The
reasons are not biological, but are social. Consider Jaga: although it might appear that her
(in)famous status of the local “public woman” is the result of her innate promiscuity, one cannot
but notice that it is actually defined by her unenviable social position in the village community.
As a poor widow, she cannot fully reintegrate into the village by means of new matrimony: she
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simply cannot offer a significant dowry. Hence she strategically decides to occupy the marginal
social position that might be notorious, but still attaches her to the local community and provides
her with some elemental security. She is perfectly aware of the norms and customs that run the
village life: when Iva upsettingly tells her that he is shoehorned into the arranged marriage, she
advises him to calm down and marry, as that will not preclude their own affair. In the same vein,
when Jakov attacks her for distracting his own son from his marriage, Jaga seduces him, not
simply because she is promiscuous by nature, but because she knows how to use her body in
order to negotiate her own position: by means of sex, she converts Jakov from an adversary to a
supporter.
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All of these enable us to sum up the key difference between Master of One’s Own Body
on the one hand, and Hanžeković’s previous films and historical melodramas on the other.
Whereas the latter maintain that Love and Law are antagonistic to the point of exclusion, Master
of One’s Own Body zeroes in on another antagonism: the deep contradiction that runs within the
Law itself. In other words, there is nothing innately antagonistic between love and Law. Truly
problematic is the fact that Law is never true to itself, as it were. Roža’s minimal yet persistent
demand reveals that the law inevitably betrays itself, is never up to its own self-imposed
standards, always sliding into its own mockery. As the parallel between the priest and the witch
has shown, this internal split of the Law should not be confused with the split between the
official letter-of-the-law and unofficial unwritten norms: each of these two sets of rules and
regulations is inconsistent and unstable in its own terms, as it were. It is because of this complex
view of the Law that Master of One’s Own Body avoids the clear-cut divide between the good
guys and the villains, where the former represent the benign, “official” side of the law (e.g. the
good peasant who finds Smilja, Bojan), and the latter, its obscene, sadistic flipside (Roko, Josip).
However, Master of One’s Own Body does not turn Iva into the sadist monster from whom the
good agents of patriarchy should rescue Roža: if anything, it is clear that Iva himself is also a
prey of the appalling matrimonial deal.
Instead, in a true stroke of genius, the film conflates the most benign and most malign
aspect of the patriarchal law into a single protagonist, a person who is at the same time paternal
authority at its most tyrannical and most comical: Iva’s father Jakov. In what is the running joke
of the film, Jakov develops a bizarre attachment to Pisava, the cow that belongs to Roža’s
family. The film goes to lengths to give this man-to-animal attachment an air of romantic
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infatuation: it is as if Jakov falls in love with Pisava at first sight, as it were – from the moment
he sees her she is everything that he talks about, even in his sleep. It is precisely this awkward
yet profound infatuation that presses Jakov to marry Iva to Roža: he intends to get Pisava as
dowry. When his wife tells him that Iva will most probably marry and thus get a cow anyway,
Jakov is enraged: he does not want any other cow, only Pisava! Accordingly, Iva cannot marry
any other girl but the homely Roža. The paramount illustration of the relation between the two
offers Iva’s and Roža’s wedding banquet: the feast reaches its climax when Jakov euphorically
leads all guests – including the musicians – to the barn to see Pisava, now in his possession. The
crowd, already in rather high spirits, is cheering and continues to dance in the barn, as Roža
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remains alone in the empty house, forgotten by everyone (FIGURE 5.25–26). The mismatched
pairing of Roža and Iva is thus revealed as a collateral damage on the way to the real thing: the
wedding of Jakov and Pisava.
FIGURE 5.25–26 The wedding in the barn and the lonely Roža
Master of One’s Own Body thus did not merely disclose and criticize the patriarchal habits of the
bygone era, but the fact that any law, due to structural internal contradiction, is tainted by some
unwritten, “perverse” element. Needless to say, the same goes even for the socialist law. Based
on the notion of gender equality, as it was, the socialist legislative was an unquestionable
improvement in comparison to the monarchist one, and yet, the traditional norms of male
privilege, as its obscene underside, continued to shape the socialist modernity, both in the
countryside, but also among the peasants who move to the urban and industrial surrounding. As
we shall see in the following pages, the shadow of the cow, proverbially the most sacred property
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in the traditional rural economy, will continue to roam the films about peasants even when they
relocate their setting and stories into the socialist period.
5.2.
Legacy of the rural patriarchy in the socialism-set films
For the most part of the 1950s Yugoslav cinema evaded the complexities revolving around the
rural troubles in the establishment of the socialist edifice. That is anything but surprising: the
relation between the Communist Party and the peasantry was far more intricate than the ruling
doctrine was ever willing to admit. The tensions and antagonisms between the two can be traced
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back to the pre-war political life, and they certainly complicated their synergy during WWII,
when significant portions of the peasantry did not side with the partisans (or, did that rather
reluctantly).85 Again, as the economy of the study does not allow me to dwell extensively on
these problems, let me sum these antagonisms up by drawing on Melissa K. Bokovoy’s account:
On the one hand, the peasants were numerically, militarily, and economically essential to the
revolutionary movement; on the other hand, they were often recalcitrant, obstinate, even
rebellious, and thereby an obstacle to revolution and state building. Although the Yugoslav
Communist revolutionaries held up the peasant as the ideal national patriot, they soon discovered
that neither traditional Marxist ideology nor the dominant Soviet model had a place for this
peasant. The KPJ, with surprising agility and flexibility, modified and blended its goals for
revolution into a working accommodation with the older and local forms of peasant aspirations
and resistance in the Yugoslav countryside. Yet the coalition between the radical elite and the
insurgent peasantry was an uneasy one at best, because the long-term interests of the
revolutionary elite the members of the KPJ were not necessarily those of the peasants whom they
had co-opted into the revolutionary movement.
(1998, p. xvi)
Especially telling was the filmmakers’ silence on what was indisputably the most traumatic postwar socialist venture in the countryside: the collectivization of agriculture by means of the
peasant work cooperatives. Launched in 1949, the collectivization prompted the peasants to a
first mass political resistance against the communist rule; faced with the peasant disobedience,
the communists eventually gave up on the reform in 1953 (Bokovoy, 1998). In the early 1950s,
thus, only Lake and Life at Kajžar tackle the issue, optimistically rendering the cooperatives as
the ultimate realization of the socialist principles in the countryside. No major film will dare to
directly address the trauma of the collectivization before the early 1970s.
However, in the late 1950s filmmakers finally started to screen the peasantry and
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countryside in the contemporary setting in the more complex ways, leaving behind the
imperatives of the socialist happiness and triumph as testified in the films set in the socialist
village in the process of modernization.86 Even with the painful experience of collectivization
85
After the case of the troubled peasant-partisan Gvozden in Distant is the Sun (1953), at least two more films
tackle the issue of ideological allegiance of the peasantry to the socialist revolution: Njih dvojica/The Two of Them
(1955, Žorž Skrigin), and Šolaja (1955, Vojislav Nanović); from the 1960s on, this motif will become more
pronounced on screen.
86
Exemplary in that regard is Svet na Kajžarju/Life at Kajžar (1952, France Štiglic), a drama about confrontation
between the communists and the reactionary forces in an agricultural cooperative in Slovenian countryside.
Unfortunately, as the film remained out my reach during the research, I cannot analyze this example in more detail
here. However, drawing from the film’s synopsis (Furlan et al., 1994, p. 37), it appears the film offers a notable
attempt of reconciliation of the “good woman” and the “bad woman”. Jula, the principal female character – a
peasant woman who fully commits herself to the revolutionary change – tries to redeem Lizika who had an affair
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untouched, the socialist vicissitudes of the rural population yielded many antagonisms and
contradictions waiting to be cinematically elaborated.
Cesta duga godinu dana/The Year Long Road (1958, Giuseppe de Santis), a film about
the villagers who decide to build a road from their craggy village toward the sea,
symptomatically renders visible that shift between the prewar-set and postwar-set peasant films.
The opening credits inform us that the film is set in some “imaginary land” in order to make its
story more universal. 87 The government in the film resembles the provincial officials of the
royalist regime, and hence suggests the prewar period; however, the enthusiasm of the people
about making the titular road connotes the revolutionary elan of the postwar mass labor actions.
On top of this, some references are overtly post-WWII, like the one about the atomic weapons as
the dominant type of contemporary armament in the world. Along with this elusive mixture of
then-and-now, the film encompassed half a dozen of romantic plots shored up by a huge
ensemble and splashed across the Ultrascope, a German-made variant of CinemaScope, making
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it the most epic Yugoslav film to that date; the 190-minutes length only emphasized its ambition.
with a collaborator; however, the redemption of such a problematic woman is possible only over her dead body, as
Lizika gets killed by the main antagonist, a reactionary kulak Trinkhaus.
87
The setting, however, unmistakably connotes Dalmatinska Zagora (we can even see the name plate “Općina
Zagora [Municipality Zagora]”).
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FIGURE 5.27–32 The self-aware bodily display in The Year Long Road
However, here I will not deal with those romances, or with the respective gender representations,
as they remain within the optimistic framework: the sugar-coated variant of De Santis’
neorealism makes the film occasionally reach levels of the socialist-realist kitsch (e.g. the scenes
where the peasant women bring the food to the workers). True, the film does accentuate
misogynist basis of patriarchy, yet the happily-ever-after closure heals the problems all too easily:
even the most dramatic affair – a love triangle that almost wrecked a family and even ended in a
murder – is resolved in a conciliatory way. However, the most intriguing ingredient of the film
was the blatant glamorization of the bodies. De Santis foregrounds the beauty of some of the
protagonists by making them pose a pin-up style, as it were. In other words, the film does not
merely screen the beauty, but a self-reflexive beauty: both actors and actresses are displayed not
only as handsome and pretty, respectively, but as perfectly aware of their own beauty and
desirability. Such a strategy was not unprecedented in Yugoslav cinema, but it was reserved for
the actresses mainly: De Santis, for the first time, extensively represented the male bodies that
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way (FIGURE 5.27–32).
5.2.1. Train without a Time Table
A far more accomplished and important film for this analysis, is Vlak bez voznog reda/Train
without a Time Table (1959), directed by De Santis’ protégé Veljko Bulajić. The film rendered
the postwar colonization, i.e. the mass migrations of peasants from the harsh and poor regions to
the fertile plains of Pannonia (Slavonia, Vojvodina). Combining the large number of protagonists
and epic scope with the successfully employed neorealist influence, the film follows villagers
from a Zagora hamlet, on their way to the region of Baranja. The fact that some villagers refuse
to leave, and persist in their reluctance toward resettlement (i.e. the socialist modernity in general)
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pivotally indicates the shift in representation of the peasant question. Whereas, in the early 1950s
– say, in Lake – such a negative position would be rendered as merely reactionary, Train without
a Time Table not only lets the sceptical peasants remain in the poor village, but ultimately
dispenses with the clear-cut distinction between those who stay there and those who leave: some
of the former are actually aware that they made a bad choice and that Baranja is the place to be,
just as some of the latter will eventually be sorry for leaving Zagora.
The film centers on Periša and Nikolica, the wartime buddies who reunite on their way to
Baranja, and their respective romances. Eighteen-year old Periša falls in love with Dana at first
sight, a peasant girl who is also in love with him. Their tender romance is in peril due to the
patriarchal norms that rule their families. Periša’s mother and two older brothers expect him to
behave in accordance with the old ways that privileges the notion of family honour. The
patriarchal hierarchy demands from Periša to wait his turn to get married, as the older brother
Lovre should do that before him. When the boy mentions that “nowadays” one does not have to
marry after dating a girl, his shocked mother slaps him. When his oldest, married brother Duje
ridicules the notion of being in love, Periša accuses him of being in a loveless marriage: “You
have got your wife as a cow and you treat her like a slave! [Ženu si uzea ka kravu, držiš je ka
sluškinju!]”
Dana is in an even less enviable situation as her parents press her into one such loveless
marriage, arranged four years before, with a boy of a wealthy peasant who waits for her in
Baranja. When she tells that she does not even know this husband-to-be, her father Jole – the
closest the film comes to the antagonist – gently tells her that she will have a whole life ahead of
her to get to know him. He says that without a trait of cynicism in his voice, for he himself
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believes that: simply, that is how things are in the traditional patriarchal coordinates within
which he was raised and spent all his life. However, after he finds out that his daughter is seeing
Periša, Jole savagely beats her. Despite the father’s threats that she must not tarnish the family
honor, Dana breaks out at the wedding, crying out that she does not want to marry the imposed
bridegroom, as she loves another one. After the boy’s family furiously rushes out from the
wedding banquet, the humiliated and enraged father approaches Dana to beat her again. However,
his previously obedient wife stops him, this time protecting the daughter. Shocked by the
disobedience of the women that were supposed to obey him blindly, Jole realizes that the world
as he knew it is gone for good (FIGURE 5.33–34).
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FIGURE 5.33–34 Dana’s parents fight over her rights; the father looses in Train without a Time Table
Thus, despite its obvious pro-emancipatory stance, the film nevertheless successfully invites us
to identify with the palpable disorientation of a peasant man whose unbridled patriarchal
authority – the gist of his self-experience – has been radically challenged by the socialist gender
order. In that regard, Jole belongs to the lineage of the fathers whose fall from the patriarchal
throne is precipitated by their daughters’ decision to embrace the socialist modernity (Mara’s
father in Lake and Emina’s father in Zenica).
Although the last shot reunites Dana and Periša at the endless Baranja plain in the
romantic happy ending, the film does not exactly showcase the triumph of love in socialism.
Periša’s pal Nikolica, the rowdy twenty-year-old boy, enters into romances with two women,
which will both end on a sour note. He develops a crush for Ike, the widow with two small sons,
whose husband has died fighting as a partisan. Although infatuated with Nikolica, Ike eventually
gives up on him, as the traditional norms prohibit a marriage of a widow mother to a younger
man. To the boy’s farewell question, why they do not love each other, Ike bitterly responds:
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“People say that it cannot be. A mother is a mother, and a lad is a lad! [Ljudi kažu da se ne smi.
Majka je majka, a momak je momak!]” Hence, Ike turns to another man. Periša’s brother Lovre,
who is in love with Ike and adores her sons (just as they adore him). The main organizer of the
transport of the Dolac people, Lovre is mature and reliable, unlike the scatter-brain Nikolica. The
fact that he lost his leg as a partisan makes him an even more appropriate choice for Ike: in the
eyes of their community, they are conveniently compatible as the “damaged goods” (the widow,
the invalid). In any case, Ike is perfectly aware that, with Lovre, her sons will get the reliable
father, she will have a reliable husband, and the community will gain yet another stable married
couple; however, there is no doubt that Lovre is a man whom she appreciates more than she
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loves. In her last scene, Ike and Nikolica embrace in their first and last, good-bye kiss – arguably
the last passionate kiss in her life. As he leaves, her sons are returning home in company of
Lovro; he stands in front of Ike – even below her, for she is above him, in the doorway – as if
waiting for her permission to let him in her home and life. Torn between different impulses, Ike
thus finally chooses the man whom she does not desire, but who can give her the “quiet life” that
she craves. In a telling detail, she lets Lovro in the house only after her sons start calling for him,
and after Lovro himself, hearing the voices of the children, asks: “May I?” The voices of the
boys thus remind Ike that her chief identity is the one of the mother, who is first and foremost
defined in terms of the care for children, which, according to the patriarchal rules, are provided
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with the presence of a strong male, paternal authority in the family (FIGURE 5.35–38).
FIGURE 5.35–38 Ike and Nikolica share a farewell kiss; Lovre arrives as Nikolica leaves
Nikolica also fails to find romantic bliss with Venka, the girl who is head over heels in love with
him, although she knows that he actually desires Ike. Despite spending some time together and
even having sex, both of them are painfully aware that he cannot reciprocate the girl’s desire.
Eventually, after saying good-bye to Ike, Nikolica also leaves Venka: “Do not cry for me, for it
is better to lose me than to have me [Nemoj plakat za mnom, mene ti je bolje izgubit nego imat’].” It
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is not an empty statement. By that point Nikolica has come to terms with his fallibilities, which
make him the most complex character in the film.
In his first scene, Nikolica boasts a wide smile and seems the happiest person under the
sun. Carefree and perky, he drops the monotony of his post-war life, and uses the colonization as
a springboard for further professional development. He is utterly enchanted by modernity in
every way possible. Out of UNRRA humanitarian aid, he proudly picks up the shirt with the
“Crystal Lake” logo, the illustration of his fascination with the USA; he also likes to use some
“modern” words although he does not understand them (e.g. he compliments the girls for
“looking frigid”). But this penchant for modernity runs deeper than these superficial emblems
might suggest, enticing Nikolica to his own vision of modern life: “It should be so, that the man
is a railroader for two years, then an artist for two, a sailor for two, a fotographer for two… I
would like to be everything! [Tribalo bi da bude tako, da je čovik dvi godine željezničar, dvi
godine umjetnik, dvi godine mornar, dvi godine fotograf... Ja bi’ htia sve bit!]” It is no wonder,
then, that Nikolica despises his own rural background: to be a peasant in modern times is to
negate modernity as such. That means to remain stuck in the dirt and mud, and at the mercy of
the primordial elements, to never leave one’s own turf and thus miss the opportunity to travel
and see the big cities where modernity thrives. Therefore, Nikolica first dreams of being a
railroader, because they “travel all the time! They see the world! Vienna, Rome, Paris...” In his
last scene, he opts for an even more mobile profession: a truck driver. This starry-eyed peasant
boy is too enchanted by the open vistas and never-ending roads to remain within the confines of
a rural household.
And yet, under Nikolica’s fantasies of modern mobility, urbanity, and industry, lurks a
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far more somber side. In the most devastating scene that features a young man, Nikolica gets
drunk, his layers of happiness and devil-may-care attitude being swiftly peeled away. What
remains in front of us, is a boy who is thoroughly soaked in self-pity and grief after his family
was killed in the war. At one point, Nikolica even runs amok and starts pretending that he is
shooting from his machine gun at the invisible enemy. To anyone who remembered the first
post-war days, this sight unmistakably demonstrated that Nikolica suffered from the so-called
“partisan disease”, a sort of post-traumatic stress disorder specific for the partisans. The people
affected by the disorder, among other symptoms, used to stop all of their daily activities and,
besotted by the hallucinations, “re-created” the war combats in fits that were reminiscent of
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psychotic or hysterical episodes. In that sense, Nikolica embodies an important step forward in
representing the war trauma: Nikolica’s emotional scars might be invisible at first sight, but they
affect him more profoundly than that the bodily handicap affects his rival Lovre (this comparison
also extends to the severely somatically handicapped war veterans in Only Human and I Will Be
Back).
FIGURE 5.39–40 Nikolica suffers a mental breakdown that resembles “the partisan disease”
This profound inner split that derails Nikolica from a supposedly normal life, makes the
misfortunate boy one of the first genuinely proto-modernist protagonists that marked the
Yugoslav cinema in 1959, and whom I mentioned in the introduction together with the suicidal
Marija in Heaven Without Love, the loner Marko in a search for the daughter in Three Girls
Named Anna, the underage delinquent Rade in The Doors Remain Open, and the cowardly
partisan Čavka in Alone – this wretched gallery reminds us that it was the classical Yugoslav
cinema that introduced the celluloid individual who is “out of joint”, irreparably split both from
within and from her or his surroundings, i.e. the fact that it pointed that the socialist modernity,
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due its limitations, antagonisms and deadlocks, cannot recuperate such an individual.
5.2.2. Boom Town
Two years after Train without a Time Table, Bulajić directed another film about the rural masses
on the move. This time, they did not change one rural setting for another, but for the industrial
and urban one. Uzavreli grad/Boom Town (1961) is set in Zenica, as the iconic site of the
Yugoslav rapid industrialization, and interweaves the stories of a group of newcomers – mostly
peasants – at the construction site in Zenica steel factory, where the new blast furnace has to be
finished in extremely hard conditions and in record time. u The workforce does not encompass
only mature men, as one would expect given the heavy-industry environment, but also young
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boys, girls, and women, either in the form of whole families, couples, or singles. The myriad of
the plot lines outnumbers those in Train without a Time Table, and offers a more complex
picture of peasants’ gender troubles at the junction of the traditional and the modern.
Remarkably, not a single plot closes on an overtly optimistic note; instead, the ambiguities,
uncertainties, and contradictions reign.
For starters, at its most general, the film does not designate the rapid industrialization as a
utopian project carried out by enthusiastic protagonists, who are guided by the noble strivings
and the absolute ideological commitment. Whereas the peasants in Train without a Time Table
could choose to go to Baranja or not, most of the characters in Boom Town explicitly state that
did not want to come to Zenica, but were ordered to come there, or were even deported. We first
hear it from the main female protagonist Riba, the prostitute from the harbor city of Rijeka who
has been sentenced to work in Zenica in order to be “corrected” and re-socialized (the train car
with the prostitutes was literally sealed during the trip). The main male protagonist Šiba, the
foreman of the construction site, reminds his wife that he came to Zenica because it was assigned
to him; the end of the film finds him leaving Zenica for another construction site, again against
his will. In a moment of weakness, even the chief engineer Plavšić – a far cry from Boro, the
engineer from Zenica – admits that he actually did not want to be at the furnace construction site,
and that he is not even qualified to be there in the first place. However, the imperatives of the
post-war construction and industrialization did not care for such “trifles”.
In a crucial part of his confession, however, the engineer reduces his professional
problems to the marital ones: “Do you know, gentlemen, what my wife is doing in Belgrade at
this moment? You do not! Well, neither do I. For five years now, I have been wandering around
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the province. Jablanica divorced me from my first wife, Vinodol from my second, and Zenica
will divorce me from this one, because I do not own an apartment! [Znate li, gospodo, šta sad
radi moja žena u Beogradu? Ne znate!? Ne znam ni ja. Već pet godina ja se potucam po
provinciji. S prvom ženom rastavila me Jablanica, s drugom Vinodol, a s ovom će Zenica – jer
nemam stana!]” The way in which Plavšić short-circuits the problems of the industrial
development with the romance and marriage, is illustrative of the way in which the film
persistently uses the industrial development as a backdrop for the modern realignment of the
gender relations as the substantial theme of the film. Virtually all major protagonists – except the
convicted prostitutes and a petty thief – are peasants who have to negotiate the rural patriarchal
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tradition with the urban and industrial modernity.88 They do it not merely by becoming good
labourers, but, primarily, by transforming – or, in some cases, failing to transform – their genderrelated ways and habits. The film does not imply that there is one proper formula of gender
modernity that needs to be learned, nor does it draw a line between the traditional patriarchy and
the modern socialist gender regime. The negotiation between the two remains fuzzy and openended process with no clear-cut solutions and stances.
Already, the establishing scene subtly sets the stage for exploring gender in-between the
traditional/rural and the modern/urban. Out of the darkness of the night, the steam train with the
prospective labourers approaches Zenica. Their rural background is indicated even before we see
them, with the traditional folk song that slowly emerges as the train comes from the distance.
Joyfully sung by the peasant women and combined with the rhythmic noise of the steam engine,
the song is about flirting and love. It is a highly charged detail that reminds us that, in the
patriarchal tradition, singing the folklore songs was one of the rare opportunities for the peasant
woman to express her romantic passion in public. The motif will evolve throughout the film, as
the folklore songs will be sung in the local tavern. Again, they are sung by women, but, now,
significantly transformed with the new musical arrangement, making, what was usually labeled
in Yugoslav popular culture as the “road-inn [kafanska]” or, later, “newly-composed folk music
[novokomponovana narodna muzika]” (Hofman, 2010). That makes Boom Town one of the first
films that tackled this specific soundtrack of the Yugoslav socialist modernity.
Due to the large number of the protagonists, Boom Town is an even more ensembledriven film than Train without a Time Table, so, I will sum up several plot lines in order to
illustrate the pivotal role of gender in the negotiation between the rural/traditional and the
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urban/modern. Young sprightly Jovica arrives to Zenica with the rest of his family, which stand
for the traditional, rural patriarchy, at its purest. His father is the undisputed patriarch and his
mother is an utterly submissive wife. The boy uses the arrival to Zenica to challenge the father’s
absolute authority, and claims the rights that he would hardly get if they had remained in the
village: economic independence (he protests against his father taking his wage), and the freedom
to choose his romantic partners (he falls in love with, and starts dating a girl without the
knowledge of his parents). These new claims are intertwined with the remarkable shift in
88
Symptomatically, shortly before his speech, even the engineer Plavšić is mistaken by the fellow workers as a
peasant.
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Jovica’s self-experience: he fiercely renounces his rural identity, and rushes to adopt the urban,
modern one. When the father decides to return to the village, disappointed with the wage at the
construction site, Jovica makes it clear that he has no intention of returning to the village: “I am
not a peasant anymore, but a worker! [Ja više nisam seljak, nego radnik!]” He even finds a
paramount role model for the transformation from the peasant to a modern man: it is none other
than Nikola Tesla, whose biography graces the local bookshop. The boy is amazed that the
champion of science, who introduced the electricity to the world, was a peasant boy from a
Yugoslav countryside, just like himself.
Integral to Jovica’s attempt to re-fashion himself as the urban boy, is his romance with
Hajra, a peasant girl who came to Zenica before him, and works as the cleaning lady in the
factory ambulance. Jovica quickly learns that the peasants and the city boys differ in the way
they court the girls: the latter use more poetic phrases but also jump to kisses and bodily contact
faster than the former. Jovica’s attempts to imitate the city courting habits, offers some comic
relief, as the two of them, as a couple, are expressly learning the ways of city life: they buy
modern clothes, sport new hairstyles, start going out at public places such as clubs etc. However,
the film does not designate the couple’s shift as an unambiguous progress from the
traditional/rural/patriarchal to the modern/urban/emancipated. Despite standing up to his father’s
authority, Jovica does not fight the patriarchal norms as such, as he sticks to those that work for
him. He might have renounced his rural background, but the power relation that defined the
marriage of his parents survives in his own relationship: Jovica continues to dominate Hajra who,
despite her new city looks, actually remains as submissive as Jovica’s mother.
Arguably the most extreme illustration of the tension between the rural and the urban can
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be found in the storyline involving Luka, the assembler. With his professional skills and urban
appearance, Luka stands as the ultimate embodiment of the modern masculinity. His key trait is
his shameless philandering, which, in combination with his obsession with his own looks, makes
him “a male whore” – quite a remark, given that it comes from Riba, the prostitute. Luka’s
unscrupulousness reaches its peak in the seduction of Rada, the peasant girl who came pregnant
to Zenica, believing that the father of the child – a peasant boy from her village – would also
arrive there so they would get married; however, the boy severs every contact with her. Luka
seduces the young single mother by empathically criticizing the father of the child as the coward
who neglects his own child: “How could a man be such a pig and leave such a woman and such a
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child? Only a peasant would do that! A city man would never!” [Kako može jedan čovjek da
bude takva svinja da ostavi ženu i ovakvo dijete? To samo može seljak, gradski čovjek to ne bi
učinio!]” And yet, later in the film we find out that, behind his perfect mask of the city tomcat,
Luka is actually a peasant who himself left his wife and three children three years ago. After
roaming many construction sites in search of him, his family arrives to Zenica in one of the most
harrowing scenes of the film. The forewoman decides to use the arrival of Luka’s family to
debunk him in front of all factory women – the act of punishment for him and the cautionary
example for them. As the women labourers surround Luka and confront him with his wife and
children, the reaction of Luka’s oldest, teenage son encapsulates the ambiguity of the scene. The
boy approaches his father and starts slapping him in anger, but, eventually burst into tears and
they embrace; the original despise is but a mask of the profound love and devotion. Women, who
gathered to witness Luka’s getting comeuppance for his misdeeds, actually start crying deeply
affected by the family reconciliation.
The case of Šiba also reveals that the man’s loyalty to modernity does not mean that he
will smoothly adopt the anti-patriarchal norms and fully support the gender equality. As the
foreman, Šiba tries his best to get the work done, but also tries too hard to assert himself as the
infallible man who knows best. However, his judgments and decisions are a hit-and-miss, to say
the least, and engineer Plavšić warns him that, despite being good-intentioned, his decisions have
to fit the engineer’s calculations and plans. When Šiba’s headstrongness causes the wreckage of
a machine, leading to a severe delay in the work, Plavšić chastises the foreman by accusing him
of incompetence: “What do you know! This is about mathematics! Everything is calculated! Did
I not tell you to stay out of things which you know nothing about! [Šta ti znaš! Ovdje postoji
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matematika! Sve je proračunato! Jesam li ti rekao da se miješaš u stvari koje ne znaš?]” At the
same time, Šiba is exposed to the dismissive gaze of the laborers who witnessed the disastrous
effects of his incorrect judgment. The whole affair thus shatters Šiba’s symbolic status of the
self-designated master of the construction site and, by extension, his own newly constructed
identity as the modern man.
Shortly after the incident, and Plavšić’s snubbing, Šiba is pleasantly surprised with the
unexpected visit from his wife. A brief exchange reveals that she lives with their kids in the
village, taking care of their upbringing, whereas Šiba is being sent around as foreman, from one
construction to another – a testimony that the socialism did not substantially change the relation
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femininity and domesticity in the rural milieu. However, when she jokingly reports that their son
does not like school and that he failed arithmetic, Šiba bursts in rage: “Failed arithmetic!? Don’t
you know how important that is! Do you want our children to get embarrassed in front of others
when they grow up? Here I am, struggling, and you can’t even handle the children! Go away!
Don’t come back until you make them study! Leave! [Jedan iz računa!? Pa znaš li ti šta znači
račun! Hoćeš da nam se djeca sutra crvene pred drugima? Ja se tu mučim a ti ne možeš ni djecu
da savladaš! Idi! Ne izlazi mi na oči dok ih ne natjeraš da uče! Idi!]” Flabbergasted by Šiba’s
reaction, the wife starts crying and, speechless, immediately leaves the city. Even with the
knowledge of the previous incident – the fact that Plavšić dismissed him as ignorant in terms of
calculating and planning – Šiba’s fit of anger and dispatch of the wife are exaggerated, especially
given that she visited him after a long time, and that she come from far away .
The excessive attack on his wife is not the only indicator of Šiba’s irresponsible relation
to his matrimony. Seduced by Riba’s singing in the tavern, he gets drunk and ends up sleeping
with her. In yet another of the film’s many short-circuits between the professional/public and
romantic/private, Šiba’s sex with Riba is both a marital and a professional failure. While he
cheats on his wife, Šiba does not realize that he is the one who has been actually cheated. Riba
seduced him in order to distract him from the sabotage that is organized by her fellow women
laborers (which I will address later). In the overall picture of Šiba’s deeds and misdeeds, it is
precisely his betrayal of the husband role that appears utterly irredeemable. Ironically, when the
factory management punishes Šiba by discharging him to the construction site in a provincial
town, we see him reunited with the family. In a sort of negative to the opening scene, the last
scene features the night train that takes Šiba from Zenica, this time together with his wife and
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children; one cannot but wonder whether he will repeat the same mistakes of the masculine pride
and disregard for the family in the new surroundings.
In opposition to these examples, one romance fails to achieve the matrimonial/familial
status. It is an unlikely couple of Jefto, a simple minded peasant, and Marica, one of the
prostitutes from Rijeka. Although their mutual feelings give birth to a tender relationship, it
nevertheless remains suffused with friction. The male workers are mocking the couple because
of Marica’s unholy past, which triggers Jefto’s violent impulses that lurked underneath the
surface of his calm demeanour. Perfectly aware of her past, Jefto does not question Marica about
it, and tacitly expects from her to completely and utterly erase all traces of her old self; thus he
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becomes enraged when she almost automatically sends a flirting gaze to a guy in a restaurant
who paid for her drink. Marica, for her part, also desperately wants to change her ways and feels
genuinely for Jefto. However, in the film’s finale, Jefto accidentally meets his death while trying
to prevent the torrents to flood the construction site. Symptomatically, his death prevents the
only romantic, i.e. prospective marital relationship between a peasant and a citizen. In other
words, for all its romantic variations, the film does not maintain the possibility of love that would
cross the line between the rural and the urban. Bulajić’s film is hardly exceptional in that regard:
any broader mapping of Yugoslav cinema in the late 1950s and early 1960 would reveal that love
does not travel well across the class lines.
And yet, something does succeed in crossing the divide between the rural and the urban:
women’s solidarity and transfer of knowledge. In one of the most ingenious scenes of the film,
the forewoman Nuna, invites Riba to learn the peasant women to dance. The prostitute explains
that dance is not merely a string of steps, but a strategy that is part gender equality: “Every
woman must know that she is equal to the man, and she can only know if she can dance [Svaka
žena mora da zna da je ravnopravna s muškarcem, a to može jedino ako zna plesati].” As she
sings and dances to a popular beguine, she also teaches them to subtly dominate their male
partners by keeping specific appearance: “When you dance with a man, you have to act
indifferent, and only touch him with your foot once in a while, as if, by accident. If he does the
same to you, you must act surprised: ‘What!? Fiddledeedee! Mind your manners, please!’ A
woman must be gracious, supple...” [Kad plešete s muškarcem, morate se praviti mrtvi ‘ladni,
samo ga tek malo, tu i tamo, dodirnete nogom, kao slučajno. Ako on vama to isto uradi, vi se
strašno iznenadite: ‘Šta!? Koješta! Kakav je to način, molim vas!’ Žena mora biti graciozna,
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elastična...]” – and proceeds to show them how to sway their hips. By 1961, the popular modern
music and dance was an important ingredient of Yugoslav cinema, usually in the comedies.
However, no other Yugoslav film used the popular music so cleverly, as an agent of social
change, in which the prostitute – the most unlikely epitome of the modern urban woman at that
time – introduces the illiterate peasant women to the notions of gender equality and the new,
modern and urban femininity.
This is not to say that Riba’s lessons about men and romance are flawless; after all, it is
Riba herself who at one point becomes a prey of her own romantic philosophy, falling in love
with a man who does not return her love. In her last scene, she even leaves Zenica by stopping a
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truck and asking an unknown driver to take her away. I argue that the scene does not simply
designate Riba as an inveterate promiscuous woman who cannot but return to her old trade, but
as a woman who, after a short experiment in Zenica, realizes that the new type of modernity does
not offer her significantly different opportunities to prosper; for that reason, she opts for “the
devil she knows”.
Other women handle their own with the different stakes and results. In the last segment of
the film, both the peasant women and prostitutes scheme sabotage: crammed in a shabby cabin
and afraid that they will not get a real accommodation before the fall and winter, they decide to
burn the cabin and move into an empty building that awaits the families of the engineers.
Convinced that their men would not approve of such a radical measure, they do it on their own
and clandestinely. As the flames destroy their poor habitat, they persuade their husbands that
they should promptly storm the new building. Their scheme remains unrevealed: the only person
who realizes what happened is the forewoman Nuna, but, despite her stark demeanour, she is all
too aware of the needs of her women colleagues to debunk them.
However, just as the film remains ambiguous toward the patriarchal legacy, the same
goes for this women’s act. On the one hand, one can hardly imagine a more justified act, as it
corresponds to the women’s (and not only their) undisputable needs; on the other hand,
immediately after being accomplished, the positive outcome of the justified revolt turns into its
very negation: the women entice their men not to leave the building, although they should go out
and stop the flood that is threatening the construction site. Knowing that the water is traditionally
considered “the feminine element”, one can even interpret the dangerous flood as the
materialization of the female rage that, after being suppressed so long, erupts in the final segment
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of the film and threatens with obliterating the whole site. In an almost mythical moment, a man –
Jefto – drowns in the torrents, as a sort of masculine sacrifice that needs to be made in order to
appease the untamed feminine waters.
5.2.3. The Superfluous One
Prekobrojna/The Superfluous One (1962, Branko Bauer) revisits the youth labor action for the
first time after Life is Ours. The film is set at the construction site, the highway “Brotherhood and
Unity”, the longest and biggest road structure built in Yugoslavia in another epic mass public
works carried out by youth labor brigades. The adolescent peasant Mikajilo, the male protagonist,
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arrives to the youth labor action with the aim to learn to drive; he dreams of leaving his village
and working as the chauffeur or truck driver. Ranka, the girl from the same village, blindly
follows him as her husband-to-be. Apparently, her motive is not genuine love, but the shame that
she feels before the village. Some time ago Mikajilo kissed her, and since “we know what that
means in the village”, Ranka almost obsessively stalks him, resolved to make him marry her and
thus save her honor. She is horrified with the prospect that he would learn to drive and leave the
village, i.e. abandon her.
FIGURE 5.41–42 Mikajilo is trying to get away from Ranka
The dichotomy between the main characters is thus unambiguously gendered. Whereas
the man is aware of the possibilities provided by the socialist modernity and uses them in order
to educate himself and leave the village for the city, the woman is not only ignorant of the
revolutionary change around her, but effectively thwarts it by preventing the revolutionary
realization of the man. Ranka’s lack of awareness of the revolutionary change, both at the
societal and the personal level, is what really makes her the superfluous one. While reading the
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register, the commander of the youth brigade discovers two more superfluous persons; however,
they are both boys, who recognized the labor action as an opportunity to change their lives for
the better. Ranka is the only one who arrives at the construction site merely guided by the ways
of the past.
And yet, the superfluous here does not mean worthless or purposeless. The main point of
the revolutionary project is its radical openness and inclusiveness: it provides the room even for
those who are unaware of its nature and who thus might appear at odds with it. One could argue
that it is this very openness for the superfluous ones that makes the revolution “non-all”, if we
may use Lacanian lingo here: the revolutionary project can never be completed; there is always
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something that at first seems to be outside the revolution or incommensurable with it, and yet it
eventually finds its proper place in the revolutionary order.
Very soon, however, it turns out that the introductory dichotomy of the male/modernity
(Mikajilo) versus the female/pre-modernity (Ranka) is anything but absolute. Not only does it
not describe the other characters in the film, but it does not take long before the tables turn even
for the main protagonists. Mikajilo’s attempts at self-realization wind up in keeping up
appearances. He boastfully pretends to be something that he is not, and hides what he perceives
as his own shortcoming: his rural background. The fellow brigadiers eventually mock his
desperate attempts to appear modern – the expected fate for anyone who tries way too hard. In
the end, Mikajilo does not accomplish the aim that brought him to the brigade: he learned how to
drive, but instead of driving the truck in the city, he decides, disillusioned, to stick to the tractors
back in his village.
For her part, however, Ranka gradually but irreversibly becomes aware of the new social
horizon emerging before her. Unlike Mikajilo, she does not pretend to be part of modernity
already. She is genuinely surprised with the things she learns, and instead of Mikajilo’s know-itall posture, she does not shy away from acknowledging her ignorance, or from expressing her
amazement and joy with the little things that she learns about the modern life. Acknowledging
the new opportunities surrounding her, Ranka starts attending sowing classes. Even more
importantly, she finds about the more jovial aspects of the modern living thanks to her new
friend, whose modern worldview is connoted through her passionate attachment to cinema: she is
a film fan (e.g. she says that Mikajilo resembles Anthony Perkins), and she was even an extra in
a film.
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More overtly than in Boom Town, the urban/rural divide in the film de facto stands for the
class barrier. The films fuels on the rivalry between the competing brigades, one dominated by
urban youth (students), the other by youth from the countryside; colloquially, they even talk refer
to themselves as “the student” and “the peasant brigade”.89 Mikajilo’s demise starts the moment
he attempts to transgress this barrier. He sneaks in to the student brigade, and in a desperate
attempt to pass as the modern guy he piles up the markers of urban life style (expensive watch,
fancy shoes). He even develops a crush for a pretty student girl; her refusal of his love will
89
Although The Superfluous One effectively obfuscates the status of the working class or the city poor, Bauer’s
films such as Tri Ane/Three Anas (1959), Licem u lice/Face to Face (1963), and Doći i ostati/To Come and to Stay
(1965) zero in on the working class in his subsequent films.
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precipitate the climax of the discord between Mikajilo and the students. Mikajilo’s being stuck
in-between the urban and the rural is humorously summed up in a scene at the brigadiers’ revue.
Whereas the brigadier choir sings about connecting the Village and the City [“Naša pesma svud se
čuje, grad i selo povezuje!”], Mikajilo is caught on stage (for he is not part of the act), as if lost
between the Village and the City, a living proof of the antagonism that songs tries to sing away
(FIGURE 5.43).
FIGURE 5.43–44 Mikajilo stuck in-between the Village and the City (left); Ranka sings
Ranka handles the urban/rural divide in an altogether different manner. She never
denounces or hides her peasant background, yet that does not her prevent her from acquiring
student friends and from adopting the modern knowledge. She incarnates the blend of the
traditional and modern, which is perfectly epitomized in a scene when Ranka is singing a
traditional folk song from her village: at first, she is completely unaware that she is being
recorded on tape; when her singing is then reproduced via the public speakerphones in the labour
camp, she is bewildered by listening her own voice loudly reproduced in open air (FIGURE
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5.44).90 It seems that The Superfluous One suggests that such bewilderment with our tradition is
the only proper way to actually become modern. One should not cheat on modernity, as Mikajilo
attempted, but allow being surprised and amazed by it, and getting to know its norms and ways
with a child-like innocence. This sort of attitude makes Ranka a true subject of modernity.
The Superfluous One unabashedly wears its gender agenda on its sleeve. Ranka receives
her first lesson on the new gender order from a fatherly engineer shortly after her arrival in the
90
The rest of the soundtrack also mediates between the tradition and modernity: the accordion player plays the
modern tunes, the revolutionary songs, and the folklore melodies equally good. It is precisely in such moments –
when the entire collective participates in the song and dance – that the rural/urban and the traditional/modern
dichotomies collapse.
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brigade. With an open contempt for the rural customs, he summarizes the traditional village
matchmaking at its most senseless: “first a kiss, then the boy gives the girl a handkerchief, and
already it is time for the aunt to come and arrange the engagement and the marriage”. His final
advice to Ranka does not leave any doubts as to who suffers the most in the traditional rural
community:
Stop slobbering and be happy that they hadn’t married you off! I know those marriages and
romances of yours! You are still being sold as the cattle, and then, for the rest of your life, you
would walk after some Mikajilo, three steps behind him, washing his legs and working hard, and
he would kick you when he gets drunk! That is what that love of yours is all about! Go on now,
and give it some thought...
Prestani da sliniš i budi sretna što te nisu udali. Znam ja te vaše udaje i ljubavi! Još vas prodaju
ko telad, a posle bi celog veka išla iza nekog Mikajila tri koraka, prala mu noge i rintala, a on bi
te nogom kad se napije! Eto, to je ta vaša ljubav! Hajde, hajde, i razmisli malo...
By the film’s final third, Ranka’s relation to the rural tradition will shift from an unconditional
submission to bitter criticism. When Mikajilo reclaims his peasant side and attempts to reconnect
with Ranka, he is stunned by the fact that she is no more the girl who blindly followed him to the
construction site. To his disbelief, she discards his recollections of their early pastoral love with
profound skepticism.
How, then, the film copes with the apparent fact that paths of Ranka and Mikajilo
bifurcate? By its finale, the film is at pains in trying to have its cake and eat it too. On the one
side, the genre conventions require the standard happy end, i.e. the reunion of the love couple,
just like in Bauer’s previous love stories Only Human and Martin u oblacima/Martin the Clouds
(1961). However, the great divide between Ranka and Mikajilo is patently insurmountable to be
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healed with a romantic happy ending. The solution to this dilemma came in the form of the
film’s ending, one of the most ambiguous in Yugoslav cinema.
The film’s last scenes provide the solution that is at the same time very simple and rather
complex. I have already mentioned that Mikajilo resolved his “the city or the village” dilemma
by opting for the later but with the new knowledge of mechanics: he might not be driving in the
city, yet he will be driving after all. And, how does Ranka solve her dilemma? Apparently, there
is no reason for her not to do the same as Mikajilo: she could easily go back to the village with
him, equipped with the new knowledge and skills (of sewing, reading, writing...), that way
getting both Mikajilo and her newly constituted self. However, not only does she not do that, but
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she does not leave for the city either. Instead, she decides to stay at the construction site for one
more shift, to work and learn. One could say that by doing so she actually refuses to accept
Mikajilo’s dilemma as her own; she thus ditches both solutions – the city and the village – as
wrong for her at the moment.
While Mikajilo is leaving the site, they do not kiss or embrace, but share a clumsy, swift
handshake, not unexpected if one knows that two of them never kissed or exchanged any
sentimentality in the film. However, only after Mikajilo’s truck departs the site, he calls for
Ranka to run after the vehicle so he can give her the textbook from the camp’s school. She does
so, starting to shout his name (as he shouts her), picking up the dropped book from the road, with
a photo of Mikajilo (in his traditional, folklore clothes), and waves goodbye to the truck
disappearing in the distance. To his shouts “Get back! [Vrati se!]”, she silently utters “Yes...
[Da...]”, and smiles while the tears run down her face (FIGURE 5.45–50).
The ending thus invites the thought that the two will reunite when Ranka, after another
shift at the construction site, returns to the village. However, the fact that she remains at the site,
serves as an uncanny remainder of the gap between the two and of the radical openness of the
situation for Ranka. This ambiguity makes the film’s ending superior to the finales of Bauer’s
previous romantic films, even if they are superior to The Superfluous One as a whole. Ranka’s
running after the truck, the photo of Mikajilo, her smile and tears, her silent “Yes”: as much as
all these elements signify her love for Mikajilo, they do not necessarily signify the inevitability
of a happy reunion. In one and the same move, these elements designate the moment when
Ranka finally realizes that she actually loves Mikajilo and feels free to express this love, but they
also point out that Ranka realizes that if she wants to save the purity of this love, she has to keep
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it unrealized, “at the distance”. The only way to remain loyal to her love for Mikajilo, as she felt
it in this particular moment, is not to return to him, but to continue to cherish the memory of him
(with the photo of him as a peasant, for example).
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FIGURE 5.45–50 The elusive ending of The Superfluous One
However, to firmly argue that Ranka will not return to Mikajilo would be to make a
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mistake symmetrical to the interpretation that would unambiguously go for the reunion. The
point of the film’s finale does not actually lie in choosing any of these options as the definitive
one, but precisely in short-circuiting them in an unstable, open situation. What I deem the most
remarkable about this ending is its emphasis on the fact that no matter where Ranka goes once
the construction site is closed, it will be her decision. One can hardly overstate the importance
that the films gives to the female choice till the very last shot, for, as one should never forget,
The Superfluous One centres on the peasant woman who escapes the fate of the cow. Even after
all his troubles at the construction site Mikajilo can quite easily return to the countryside, since
his male privilege there will more easily remain substantially uncontested; however, Ranka’s
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return to the village – even if guided by the real love this time – invites the bitter scenario of her
disempowerment. By remaining at the construction site, Ranka stands for the unfinished
revolutionary modernity, which thus finds its ultimate embodiment in what at first looked as its
unlikely, supernumerary element.
5.3.
Conclusion
Designating the village as the social milieu with especially troubled relationship with modernity,
the peasant films in the classic Yugoslav cinema have particular importance. Unlike the
construction films (including those set in the countryside) that succumbed to the dominant fiction
of socialist modernization too fast and too easily, the peasant films critically stressed not only
those aspects of the rural tradition that were at odds with the proclaimed socialist aims, but also
revealed that the socialist modernity does not offer any sort of panacea for the many problems of
the countryside. Privileging gender-related aspects of the “peasant question”, the classic
Yugoslav cinema launched and maintained an ongoing discussion on the patriarchal norms and
customs, which served as the backbone of the traditional rural life in the pre-socialist era, and
continue to function the same way in socialism – at least to a certain point.
By rendering the rapport between the rural and the modern in the ambiguous and
complex ways, the classical representation of peasantry and countryside paved the way for an
ever increasing number of peasantry-related films in the 1960s and early 1970s across the
stylistic and generic lines. Migration tellingly figures as the dominant motif. Zemljaci/The
Countrymen (1964, Zdravko Randić), renders Bosnian peasants who travel to Vojvodina as
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season workers in the fields of Vojvodina, whereas in Po isti poti se ne vračaj/ (1965, Jože
Babič), they come to Slovenia, where they work as the underpaid, non-qualified, manual workers
in the construction business. Doći i ostati/To Come and to Stay (1965, Brano Bauer) and Tople
godine/The Warm Years (1966, Dragoslav Lazić) tackle the migration from the Serbian
countryside to Belgrade, anticipating a much more critically acclaimed Kad budem mrtav i
beo/When I am Dead and Pale (1967, Živojin Pavlović). Ovčar/Shepherd (1971, Bakir Tanović)
is a somber tale of the last seasonal nomadic shepherds while they herd their herds from the
Bosnian mountains to Slavonia. Sunce tuđeg neba/The Sun of the Strangers’ Sky (1968, Milutin
Kosovac), and Let mrtve ptice/The Flight of the Dead Bird (1973, Živojin Pavlović) tackled the
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emigration to the West. Ever convenient expression of the social change, the clash of generations
also features, to an extent, in many of these films, finding its arguably bleakest expression in
Razmedja/Borderlines (1973, Krešo Golik), a story of an old peasant, in conflict with everyone
around him, and his son, who moved to the city. The hardships of the village life test the young
men in Vreme bez vojna/The Time without War (1969, Branko Ivanovski Gapo), and in Siroma
sam al sam besan (1970, Dragoljub Ivkov). Krsto Papić remarkably explored the symbiosis of
the ideology and the traditional patriarchy in his films set in the Zagora karst: the macabre
Lisice/Handcuffs (1969), and Predstava Hamleta u selu Mrduša Donja/Playing Hamlet in the
Village of Mrduša Donja (1973). No major film will dare to directly address the trauma of the
collectivization before 1971, and the films Rdečje klasje/Red Wheat by Živojin Pavlović, and
Doručak sa djavolom/Breakfast with the Devil by Miroslav Antić. Skupljači perja/I Even Met
Happy Gypsies (1967, Aleksandar Petrović), the story about the Roma community in the muddy
plains of Vojvodina, was both a blockbuster at home, and the emblem of Yugoslav cinema
internationally. Far more controversially, Rani radovi/Early Works (1969, Želimir Žilnik),
rendered the Yugoslav village as the darkest corner of the Yugoslav socialism, virtually
untouched by the socialist modernity.
Although all of these films, of course, can be analyzed in terms of gender and sexuality, a
group of films more directly tackles these issues by focusing on the central female character.
“Put/Path”, the second segment in omnibus Vreme ljubavi/Time of Love (1966, Vlada Petrić,
Nikola Rajić), Sirota Marija/Poor Marija (1968, Dragoslav Lazić), Cross Country (1969, Puriša
Djordjević), and Opklada/The Bet (1971, Zdravko Randić), are films about peasant women who
negotiate their position within the patriarchal norms. In reverse, Nizvodno od sunca/Downstream
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from the Sun (1969, Fedor Škubonja), Biće skoro propast sveta/It Rains in My Village (1968,
Aleksandar Petrović), and Živjeti od ljubavi/To Live on Love (1973, Krešo Golik) show the urban,
modern women who move to live and work in the countryside as school teachers; Štefka from
Slike iz života udarnika/The Images from the Life of the Shock-Workers (1972, Bato Čengić) and
Jugoslava from Early Works also fit this group to some extent. The history of the patriarchal
legacy continued to inspire the filmmakers, and it is hardly a coincidence that virtually all films
set in the pre-socialist past feature central or prominent female characters: e.g., Breza/Birch Tree
(1967, Ante Babaja), Moja strana sveta/My Side of the World (1969, Vlatko Filipović), and
Lucija (1965, France Kosmač).
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The sheer number of the itemized peasant films testifies to a plethora of plots and stylistic
approaches, each of them pointing to the respective aesthetical and ideological contradictions in
store for analysis. The gender and sexuality by rule remained high on the list of motifs, building
up on the discussion about the relation between the patriarchy and socialism, which was started
by the classical peasant films. This is not to say that the peasant films as such – the classical or
the modern – were anti-patriarchal through and through, or even (proto-)feminist. It is just that,
compared to the construction and the WWII/partisan films, they operated as the broader
“interpretive arena” (Duara, 1988) for discerning and discussing some of the most pressing
effects of patriarchy in the socialist modernity (violence against women, economic dependency
of the women, the women’s illiteracy and general lack of education, the breakdown of the
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traditional family, etc.).
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Chapter 6
Conclusion
The classical Yugoslav cinema is chronically under-researched, deeply in the shadow of the
scholarly fascination with Yugoslav modern cinema in the 1960s in general, and with the
problematically defined “black wave” films in particular. Opposing to this predominant
tendency, this thesis has instigated a major reassessment of the classical Yugoslav cinema by
paying homage to its richness and vibrancy, and has demonstrated the importance of the gender
and sexuality-related concepts and optics in film analysis of the classical Yugoslav films. I
propose that Yugoslav cinema offers unique and opulent historical imaginary of the first stages
of Yugoslav socialist modernity. By proposing this, I do not mean that the classical Yugoslav
cinema merely mirrors the developments of, in this particular case, gender regimes of the
Yugoslav socialism from WWII to the 1960s, but that it actively contributed to them, by filling
the public space with a variety of gender-related images, narratives and motifs, all which can be
seen as the elements in the conflict of signification and meaning that was integral to the
continuous redefinition of gender regimes in socialism.
The still-predominant totalitarian paradigm pursues by now a well-known story about the
early Yugoslav socialist modernity (including its cinema): from the very start of their rule, drunk
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with the absolute power, the Yugoslav communists barely concealed their darker purposes;
dogmatism and repression reigned, cinema was one of the most important instruments of the
ideological manipulation and brainwashing; the aesthetics of socialist realism was nothing but
the more or less straightforward agitprop routine; the filmmakers could adopt the party line and
become the propagandist drones or perish. The gender-inflected analysis of the classic Yugoslav
films, however, tells another story. It reveals that even apparently crass examples of socialist
realism are far from being simple and unambiguous, but rather they are ridden with the
antagonisms, aporias and paradoxes: the communist activist in drag, the vindication of the
glamour, a homosexual priest as the good guy in the film aiming at the clergy, symptomatically
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different strategies in depicting the femininity and masculinity from one genre to another, are
just some examples. And if seemingly monolithic and bland socialist realist cinema was actually
that complex, are we to be surprised with the overall complexity of the classical Yugoslav
cinema, beyond the confines of that specific – and historically relatively short-lived aesthetics?
Looking back to the examples elaborated in the study, I cannot but be frustrated, as I had
to leave out many films that I find important due to the scope of the study. For that reason, the
thesis is a far cry from being an exhaustive overview: depending on one’s vantage point and
preference, she or he could accuse me of downplaying or excluding certain genres, authors,
themes, or even “national cinemas” (e.g. incidentally I did not analyze a single film produced by
Macedonian or Montenegrin film enterprises). I also leave room for the argument that the other
selection of the films would offer different findings. However, the major material circumstance
within which this thesis intervenes is accessibility of films – a point that might seem too obvious
to mention, but which I nevertheless have to emphasize given that many classical Yugoslav films
remain out of our sight, waiting to be restored and become accessible.
Therefore, this thesis proposes a platform of arguments and conclusions about the
specific gender motifs in a set of the classical Yugoslav films to be further elaborated through
individual and collective research projects. Future research could be conducted along many
epistemological and methodological lines, and I will outline only two of them. First, one could
pursue a more detailed study of the very same period of the cinema explored in this thesis to
include other materials: other feature films could be analyzed, but also shorts, documentaries,
and animated film; a complex relationship between the classical Yugoslav cinema and the
contemporary foreign cinemas (from Hollywood to Mexico to variety of European cinema) also
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awaits to be more fully tackled; without studies of audiences, film stars, production and other
segments of cinema history, the classical period will remain the terra incognita of Yugoslav
cinema. Equally important is the diachronic analysis of the vicissitudes of the classical Yugoslav
cinema in the 1960s. For all the international critical acclaim of the Yugoslav novi film, it is
obvious that its emergence does not occur unexpectedly and that the relation between the two is
anything but one of the outright opposition and exclusion. Also, one should not forget that the
legacy of classical cinema as the narrative mode continued to exist throughout the 1960s and
after, effectively being the most dominant and popular segment of Yugoslav cinema.
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My future research of Yugoslav cinema will certainly go along some of these lines, with
the categories of gender and sexuality remaining my main theoretical optics. I argues that just as
we should not be surprised with the antagonisms and paradoxes in the classical Yugoslav
cinema, we should not be perplexed with the inconsistencies and aporias suffusing the gender
regimes of the Yugoslav socialist modernity. Hence, we should challenge the totalitarian
paradigm in its very foundations; its “descending type of analysis”, which deduces everything
from a very fact of the communist party rule, should be replaced with a more refined
“ascending” type of socio-historical inquiry – both in relation to gender and cinema (including
their interstices).
A Yugoslav law scholar has argued that “it is possible to talk about the family in
socialism, and not about the socialist family [danas je moguće govoriti samo o porodici u
socijalizmu, a ne i o socijalističkoj porodici]” (Mladenović, 1963, p. 77, original emphasis). This
proves that one does not have to be a fervent Foucauldian to give up on to the essentialist notion
of some intrinsically “totalitarian” gender regime (subjectivity, body, etc.), but to turn to the
dynamic aspects of the Yugoslav cultural revolution. Accordingly, I would say that the plurality
of the gender-and-sexuality motifs in Yugoslav cinema from the late 1940s to the early 1960s –
contrary to the accusations for dogmatism and political control – suggest that there was no single
dominant Yugoslav socialist gender order, but that there were gender orders in the Yugoslav
cultural revolution, which were influenced by a far more numerous factors than some alleged
totalitarian subjectivity, “big Other”, or a clear-cut and straightforward ideological outline. To
explore these factors most certainly requires a multi- and interdisciplinary approach. This thesis
invites the scholars of Yugoslav cinema to come forward and contribute more assertively to such
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a project.
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Appendix
A filmography of the Yugoslav feature films, 1947–1962
The filmography encompasses all 35mm feature films made and released in Yugoslavia during
the titular period. The films that I tackle more extensively in the thesis are described here in a
more detailed way, with the following information:
THE FILM TITLE
year of the production, the film enterprise (its location: a Yugoslav city; another country
involved in the co-production)
d. – director, s. – screenwriter, c. – cinematography, m. – music, pd. – production design, cd. –
costume design, e. – editing
cast:
ts. – technical specifications: aspect ratio (standard, widescreen, Cinemascope etc.), film length
(in meters), and colour (black and white, or colour)
The other films are mentioned with only the most elemental data: the title, year of production,
the film enterprise, and the name of the director. For better or worse, I believe this is the most
convenient way both to preserve a general outline of the feature film production from 1947 to
1962, and to underline the analyzed films.
Last but not least, Nikola Popović’s Majka Katina/Mother Katina (1949) and Branko
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Marjanović’s Ciguli Miguli/Higgledy-Piggledy (1952), the two banned/shelved films, are not
included in this chronology as they were not released during this period.
●●●
SLAVICA
1947, Avala Film (Belgrade)
d./s. Vjekoslav Afrić, c. Žorž Skrigin, m. Silvije Bombardelli, pd. Jozo Janda, e. Maja Lazarov,
Dušan Aleksić
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cast: Irena Kolesar, Marijan Lovrić, Dubravko Dujšin, Carka Jovanović, Ljubiša Jovanović, Jozo
Laurenčić, Božo Nikolić, Ivka Rutić, Branko Pivnički, Braslav Borozan, Joža Rutić, Dejan Dubajić,
Predrag Milanov, Tješivoj Cinotti, Junus Međedović, Danka Paljetak, Olga Skrigin, Aleksandar
Zlatković, Marko Marinković, Andro Marjanović, Jozo Bakotić, Marija Lotsky, Tana Mascarelli, Ivo
Marjanović, Žarko Pavlović, Karlo Bulić, Pavica Benčić, Božo Alfirević, Ljubo Dijan
ts. standard, 2.740 m, black and white
ŽIVJEĆE OVAJ NAROD / THIS PEOPLE SHALL LIVE
1947, Jadran Film (Zagreb)
d. Nikola Popović, s. Branko Ćopić, c. Oktavijan Miletić, m. Fran Lhotka, pd. Miomir Denić, e.
Radojka Tanhofer
cast: Vera Ilić–Đukić, Fran Novaković, Carka Jovanović, Siniša Ravasi, Nikola Popović, Vaso
Kosić, Dobrica Milutinović, Milutin Jasnić, Aleksandar Stojković, Sima Janićijević, Joža Gregorin,
Emil Kutijaro, Miša Mirković, Ilija Nedimović
ts. standard, 2.520 m, black and white
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BESMRTNA MLADOST / IMMORTAL YOUTH
1948, Avala Film (Belgrade)
d./s. Vojislav Nanović, c. Aleksandar Sekulović, m. Mihajlo Vukdragović, pd. Lazar Milin, e.
Milanka Nanović
cast: Miloš Branković, Ivanka Veljković, Rade Marković, Irena Kolesar, Mića Tatić, Vlada Petrović,
Mila Gec, Stevan Morvai, Jovan Gec, Nevenka Mikulić, Vlada Belopavlić, Ljiljana Marjanović,
Pavle Vugrinac, Rade Milosavljević, Branko Vojnović, Sava Subašić, Branka Martić, Zoran Nikolić,
Filip Jovanović, Olga Petković, Aleksandar Jakšić, Lia Petrova
ts. standard, 2.995 m, black and white
ŽIVOT JE NAŠ – LJUDI S PRUGE / LIFE IS OURS – THE PEOPLE FROM THE RAILWAY
1948, Avala Film (Belgrade)
d. Gustav Gavrin, s. Vlatko Vlatković, c. Milorad Marković, m. Stanojlo Rajičić, pd. Jozo Janda,
Vasilije Reznikov, e. Miodrag Jovanović
cast: Borislav Gvojić, Bahrija Hadžiosmanović, Slobodan Kolaković, Jovan Antonijević, Slobodan
Slobodanović, Mihajlo Farkić, Vladan Đorđević, Sonja Aradski, Branko Mikonjić, Borislav
Gligorović, Slobodan Stojanović, Dragan Balković, Miodrag Ognjanović, Pera Milosavljević, Krsta
Stanković, Petar Govedarević, Kiro Vinokić, Jelena Ljubojević, Mihajlo Švabić, Batrić Jovanović
ts. standard, 2.534 m, black and white
NA SVOJI ZEMLJI / ON OUR OWN LAND
1948, Triglav Film (Ljubljana)
d. France Štiglic, s. Ciril Kosmač, c. Ivan Marinček, m. Marijan Kozina, pd. Boris Kobe, Tone
Mlakar, cd. Mija Jarc, e. Ivan Marinček
cast: Lojze Potokar, France Presetnik, Mileva Zakrajšek, Štefka Drolc, Miro Kopač, Avgusta Danilo,
Majda Potokar, Boris Sešek, Stane Sever, Angela Rakar, Jule Vizjak, Franjo Kumer, Stane
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Starešinič, Tone Eržen, Andrej Kurent, Gabrijel Vajt, Jože Zupan, Ivan Grasič, Janez Jerman, Jože
Gale, Oskar Kjuder, Metka Bučar, Vasja Ocvirk, Aleksander Valič, Ivan Belec, Ivan Fugina
ts. standard, 2.983 m, black and white
SOFKA
1948, Avala Film (Belgrade)
d. Radoš Novaković, s. Aleksandar Vučo, c. Stevan Mišković, m. Stevan Hristić, pd. Miomir Denić,
cd. Danka Pavlović, e. Maja Lazarov
cast: Vera Gregović, Milivoje Živanović, Marija Crnobori, Tomislav Tanhofer, Mila Dimitrijević,
Marija Taborska, Marko Marinković, Rade Marković, Mirko Milisavljević, Jovan Nikolić, Nevenka
Urbanova, Sofija Perić–Nešić, Dragomir Felba, Branko Đorđević, Vojin Tatić, Rade Brašanac
ts. standard, 2.685 m, black and white
ZASTAVA / THE FLAG
1949, Jadran Film (Zagreb)
d. Branko Marjanović, s. Joža Horvat, c. Nikola Tanhofer, m. Milo Cipra, pd. Vladimir Žedrinski,
Vladimir Tadej, cd. Inga Kostinčer, Višnja Ercegović, e. Radojka Tanhofer
cast: Sonja Kastl, Marijan Lovrić, Joža Gregorin, Antun Nalis, Josip Maričić, Zvonko Tkalec, Marija
Aleksić, Helena Vrbanić, Viktor Leljak, Ljubomir Didić, Vladimir Sušić, Josip Halla, Adam
Vedernjak, Josip Marotti, Dubravka Gall, Selma Karlovac, Olivija Andrović
ts. standard, 2.710 m, black and white
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BARBA ŽVANE / UNCLE ŽVANE
1949, Zvezda Film (Belgrade)
d./s. Vjekoslav Afrić, c. Mihajlo Ivanjikov, m. Krešimir Baranović, pd. Mića Tatić, Aleksandar
Markus
cast: Dragomir Felba, Desa Berić, Vladimir Medar, Nada Mlađenović, Branko Vojnović, Kiro
Lahčanski, Nastja Šubić, Mića Tatić, Aleksandar Markus, Rade Mlađenović, Dušan Dobrović, Kiro
Vinokić, Ivan Predić, Gita Predić–Nušić, Boško Bošković, Boban Kolaković, Miša Mirković,
Mirjana Dapčević, Vanja Kraut, Nada Bošković, Olivera Gajić, Đorđe Jelisić, Mira Nikolić
ts. standard, 3.023 m, black and white
PRIČA O FABRICI / STORY OF A FACTORY
1949, Zvezda Film (Belgrade)
d./s. Vladimir Pogačić, c. Vladeta Lukić, m. Milan Ristić, pd. Aljoša Josić, e. Olga Skrigin
cast: Marija Crnobori, Strahinja Petrović, Ljubiša Jovanović, Tito Strozzi, Salko Repak, Branko
Pleša, Bojan Stupica, Aleksandar Stojković, Ksenija Jovanović, Mira Gavrilović, Mato Milošević,
Dubravka Perić, Sava Sever, Viktor Starčić, Sima Janićijević, Dejan Dubajić, Žarko Mitrović, Joža
Rutić, Milan Živković, Milena Filipović, Slobodan Kolaković, Predrag Delibašić, Jovan Jeremić
ts. standard, 2.337 m, black and white
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JEZERO / LAKE
1950, Zvezda Film (Belgrade)
d. Radivoje Lola Đukić, s. Jug Đorđević, c. Nenad Jovičić, m. Mihajlo Vukdragović, pd. Vasilije
Reznikov, e. Milada Levi
cast: Milivoje Živanović, Vera Ilić–Đukić, Jovan Milićević, Bert Sotlar, Joža Rutić, Milan Puzić,
Jozo Laurenčić, Karlo Bulić, Aleksandar Stojković, Branka Pantelić, Dejan Dubajić, Miroslav
Belović, Vasilije Pantelić, Viktor Starčić, Branko Vojnović, Zora Zlatković, Dragutin Dobričanin,
Ivka Rutić, Vladimir Medar, Janez Vrhovec, Žiža Mažar, Zoran Longinović, Darinka Toskić
ts. standard, 2.471 m, black and white
ČUDOTVORNI MAČ / THE MIRACULOUS SWORD
1950, Zvezda Film (Belgrade), d. Vojislav Nanović
CRVENI CVET / THE RED FLOWER
1950, Zvezda Film (Belgrade)
d. Gustav Gavrin, s. Oto Bihalji-Merin, Sima Karaoglanović, c. Milorad Marković, m. Aleksej
Butakov, pd. Milan Vasić, e. Vanja Bjenjaš
cast: Dragomir Felba, Milivoje Živanović, Milan Puzić, Bojan Stupica, Jurica Dijaković, Jovan
Milićević, Vladan Đorđević, Nada Škrinjar, Drago Makuc, Sonja Hlebš, Stevo Žigon, Branko Pleša,
Karlo Bulić, Viktor Starčić, Stojan Aranđelović, Joža Rutić, Kiro Vinokić, Mića Tatić, Salko Repak,
Sima Janićijević, Zoran Ristanović, Žarko Mitrović, Mirko Milisavljević, Miodrag Petrović
ts. standard, 3.006 m, black and white
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PLAVI 9 / BLUE 9
1950, Jadran Film (Zagreb)
d. Krešo Golik, s. Geno Senečić, Hrvoje Macanović, Krešo Golik, c. Nikola Tanhofer, Slavko Zalar,
m. Bruno Bjelinski, pd. Zdravko Gmajner, e. Radojka Tanhofer
cast: Irena Kolesar, Jugoslav Nalis, Antun Nalis, Ljubomir Didić, Tješivoj Cinotti, Šime Šimatović,
Josip Daneš, Stane Sever, Veljko Maričić, Ljiljana Gener, Micika Žličar, Braco Reiss, Adam
Vedernjak, Miljenko Dragosavac, Nada Kareš
ts. standard, 2.590 m, black and white
TRST / TRIESTE
1951, Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. France Štiglic
BAKONJA FRA BRNE / MONK BRNE’S PUPIL
1951, Jadran Film (Zagreb)
d./s. Fedor Hanžeković, c. Oktavijan Miletić, m. Boris Papandopulo, pd. Vladimir Tadej, e.
Blaženka Jenčik
cast: Miša Mirković, Milan Ajvaz, Josip Petričić, Vasa Kosić, Milivoj Presečki, Milan Orlović,
Stjepan Pisek, Josip Slabinac, Josip Vikario, Aleksandar Binički, Viktor Starčić, Rahela Ferari, Šime
Šimatović, Jozo Laurenčić, Emil Kutijaro, Joža Rutić, Josip Batistić, Mira Stupica, Milena Dapčević,
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Oskar Harmoš, Dejan Dubajić, Branko Matić, Stanko Kolašinac, Ljudevit Galić, Vladimir Medar,
Ivo Jakšić, Karlo Bulić
ts. standard, 2.849 m, black and white
MAJOR BAUK
1951, Bosna Film (Sarajevo), d. Nikola Popović
POSLEDNJI DAN / THE LAST DAY
1951, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Vladimir Pogačić
DEČAK MITA / THE BOY MITA
1951, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Radoš Novaković
KEKEC
1951, Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. Jože Gale
HOJA! LERO! / HOYA! LERO!
1952, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Vjekoslav Afrić
FROSINA
1952, Vardar Film (Skopje), d. Vojislav Nanović
U OLUJI / IN THE TEMPEST
1952, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Vatroslav Mimica
SVI NA MORE / OFF TO THE SEASIDE
1952, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Sava Popović
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SVET NA KAJŽARJU / LIFE IN KAJŽAR
1952, Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. France Štiglic
KAMENI HORIZONTI / STONE HORIZONS
1953, Jadran Film (Zagreb)
d./s. Šime Šimatović, c. Branko Blažina, m. Ivo Kirigin, pd. Uroš Jurković, Ivo Lovrenčić, e. Boris
Tešija
cast: Irena Kolesar, Marko Soljačić, Boris Tešija, Jozo Laurenčić, Antun Nalis, Viktor Bek, Mirko
Perović, Stane Sever, Josip Daneš, August Cilić, Marija Sekulin, Josip Križaj, Sonja Fabič, Martin
Matošević, Dara Vrbanić, Greta Kraus, Veljko Maričić, Josip Jurčević, Aleksandar Binički, Emil
Kutijaro, Josip Batistić, Rudolf Sremec, Josip Marotti, Ljudevit Galić, Nela Eržišnik
ts. standard, 2.442 m, black and white
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OPŠTINSKO DETE / COMMUNITY CHILD
1953, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Puriša Đorđević
NEVJERA / SHAME
1953, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Vladimir Pogačić
CIGANKA / GYPSY GIRL
1953, Avala Film (Belgrade)
d. Vojislav Nanović, s. Aleksandar Vučo, c. Milenko Stojanović, m. Dragutin Čolić, pd. Milan
Vasić, cd. Jovan Ćurčić, e. Milanka Nanović
cast: Radomir Plaović, Selma Karlovac, Milivoje Živanović, Rastislav Jović, Branko Đorđević,
Mirko Milisavljević, Mihajlo Bata Paskaljević, Pavle Vuisić, Jovan Nikolić, Sima Janićijević,
Aleksandar Stojković, Janez Vrhovec, Nada Škrinjar, Vladimir Medar, Pera Obradović, Stanko
Buhanac, Divna Kostić, Ljupka Višnjić
ts. standard, 2.634 m, black and white
JARA GOSPODA / PARVENUS
1953, Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. Bojan Stupica
SINJI GALEB / THE GREY SEAGULL
1953, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Branko Bauer
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BILA SAM JAČA / I WAS STRONGER
1953, Avala Film (Belgrade)
d. Gustav Gavrin, s. Radoš Novaković, Gustav Gavrin, c. Mihajlo Popović, m. Stevan Hristić, pd.
Zoran Zorčić, e. Kleopatra Harisijades
cast: Sava Sever, Mira Stupica, Nikola Popović, Aleksandar Ognjanović, Božidar Drnić, Ljubiša
Jovanović, Fran Novaković, Ljuba Tadić, Miodrag Naunović, Miodrag Veselinović, Ivo Jakšić,
Božidar Marjanović
ts. standard, 1.900 m, black and white
DALEKO JE SUNCE / DISTANT IS THE SUN
1953, Avala Film (Belgrade)
d. Radoš Novaković, s. Josip Kulundžić, c. Nenad Jovičić, m. Krešimir Baranović, pd. Vlastimir
Gavrik, e. Neva Habić
cast: Branko Pleša, Rade Marković, Dragomir Felba, Jozo Laurenčić, Marko Todorović, Olga
Brajović, Janez Vrhovec, Rastislav Jović, Rahela Ferari, Slobodan Stanković
ts. standard, 2.800 m, black and white
236
VESNA
1953, Triglav Film (Ljubljana)
d. František Čap, s. Matej Bor, c. Pavel Grupp, m. Bojan Adamič, pd. Mirko Lipužič, cd. Mija Jarc,
e. Milka Badjura
cast: Metka Gabrijelčič, France Trefalt, Janez Čuk, Jure Furlan, Metka Bučar, Stane Sever, Elvira
Kralj, Mila Kačič, Marjeta Rupnik, Alice Cimperman, Frane Milčinski, Pavle Kovič, Olga Bedjanič,
Slavka Glavina, Alenka Svetel, Boris Kralj, Drago Zupan, Ana Grgurevič, Marjan Lombar, Ante
Gnidovec, Ana Zarnik, Pavel Biber, Antonija Ponebšek, Franc Merjasec
ts. standard, 2.617 m, black and white
SUMNJIVO LICE / A SUSPICIOUS PERSON
1954, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Soja Jovanović
POSLEDNJI MOST / DIE LETZTE BRÜCKE / THE LAST BRIDGE
1954, UFUS (Belgrade), Cosmopol film (Austria)
d. Helmut Käutner, s. Helmut Käutner, Norbert Kunze, c. Elio Carniel, m. Karl de Groof, pd. Oto
Pischinger, Kosta Krivokapić, e. Hemine Diethelm, Paula Dvorak
cast: Maria Schell, Barbara Rütting, Bernhard Wicki, Carl Möhner, Pavle Minčić, Zvonko Žungul,
Robert Meyn, Horst Hächler, Tilla Durieux, Fritz Eckhard, Janez Vrhovec, Walter Regelsberger,
Steffie Schwarz, Bata Stojanović, Stevan Petrović, Milan Nešić, Franz Eichberger, Heinrich von
Einsiedel, Pero Kostić
ts. standard, 2.800 m, black and white
CEU eTD Collection
STOJAN MUTIKAŠA
1954, Bosna Film (Sarajevo), d. Fedor Hanžeković
KONCERT / CONCERT
1954, Jadran Film (Zagreb)
d. Branko Belan, s. Vladan Desnica, c. Oktavijan Miletić, m. Silvije Bombardelli, pd. Želimir
Zagotta, e. Radojka Tanhofer
cast: Nada Škrinjar, Sonja Šagovac, Miroslav Petrović, Branko Špoljar, Rudolf Kukić, Marija Piro,
Viktor Bek, Zvonimir Rogoz, Ivan Pajić, Ana Hercigonja, Nela Eržišnik, Antun Nalis, Stevo
Vujatović, Asja Kisić, Milan Orlović, Borivoj Šembera, Relja Bašić, Vladimir Leib, Mirna Stopić,
Vlasta Hegedušić, Mila Mosinger, Anđela Baj, Neda Pataki, Boris Buzančić, Bruno Mandić
ts. standard, 2.613 m, black and white
KUĆA NA OBALI / DAS HAUS AN DER KÜSTE / THE HOUSE ON THE COAST
1954, Bosna Film (Sarajevo), J. Arthur Rank Film (West Germany), d. Boško Kosanović
ANIKINA VREMENA / ANIKA’S TIMES
1954, Avala Film (Belgrade)
237
d. Vladimir Pogačić, s. Vicko Raspor, Vladimir Pogačić, c. Aleksandar Sekulović, m. Krešimir
Baranović, pd. Nikola Radanović, cd. Desanka Pogačić, e. Milada Levi
cast: Milena Dapčević, Bratislav Grbić, Ljubinka Bobić, Mirko Milisavljević, Bosiljka Boci, Severin
Bijelić, Mata Milošević, Viktor Starčić, Milan Ajvaz, Nevenka Mikulić, Tomislav Tanhofer, Nikola
Gašić, Marinko Benzon, Žarko Mitrović
ts. standard, 2.391 m, black and white
V ZAČETKU JE BIL GREH / AM ANFANG WAR ES SÜNDE / IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE SIN
1954, Saphir Film (West Germany), Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. František Čap
DJEVOJKA I HRAST / THE GIRL AND THE OAK
1955, Jadran Film (Zagreb)
d. Krešo Golik, s. Mirko Božić, c. Frano Vodopivec, m. Branimir Sakač, pd. Frano Šimunović, cd.
Vlasta Hegedušić, e. Radojka Tanhofer
cast: Tamara Miletić, Ljuba Tadić, Miodrag Popović, Andrej Kurent, Viktor Bek, Josip Petričić,
Stojan Aranđelović, Violeta Proševska, Ivka Berković, Mia Sasso, Luka Aparac, Josip Batistić,
Drago Mitrović, Mile Gatara, Andro Marjanović, Josip Marača, Ratko Glavina, Zorka Falović
ts. standard, 2.250 m, black and white
EŠALON DOKTORA M. / ECHELON OF DOCTOR M
1955, UFUS (Belgrade), Producer group Tempo (Belgrade)
d. Žika Mitrović, s. Žika Mitrović, Dušan Zega, c. Mihajlo Al. Popović, m. Ivan Rupnik, pd. Kosta
Krivokapić, e. Vanja Bjenjaš
cast: Nađa Regin, Severin Bijelić, Marijan Lovrić, Ilija Džuvalekovski, Milivoje Popović, Vladimir
Medar, Marko Marinković, Abdurrahman Shala, Janez Vrhovec, Dragojlo Marković, Slobodan
Kolaković, Milutin Jasnić, Đorđe Krstić, Živojin Nenadović, Dragomir Bojanić Gidra
ts. standard, 2.486 m, black and white
CEU eTD Collection
KRVAVI PUT / THE BLOOD PATH
1955, Avala Film (Belgrade), Norsk film (Norway)
d. Radoš Novaković, Kåre Bergstrøm
TRI ZGODBE / THREE STORIES
1955, Triglav Film (Ljubljana)
SLOVO ANDREJA VITUŽNIKA: d. Jane Kavčič, Igor Pretnar, France Kosmač
NJIH DVOJICA / THE TWO OF THEM
1955, UFUS (Belgrade), d. Žorž Skrigin
MILIONI NA OTOKU / MILLIONS ON AN ISLAND
1955, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Branko Bauer
238
TRENUTKI ODLOČITVE / MOMENTS OF DECISION
1955, Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. František Čap
DVA ZRNA GROŽĐA
1955, UFUS (Belgrade), Nikos Skulidis & Co. (Greece), d. Puriša Đorđević
JUBILEJ GOSPODINA IKLA / JUBILEE OF MR. IKL
1955, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Vatroslav Mimica
VOLČA NOĆ / NIGHT OF THE WOLF
1955, Vardar Film (Skopje), d. France Štiglic
LAŽNI CAR / THE FALSE TZAR
1955, Lovćen Film (Budva), d. Velimir Stojanović
PESMA SA KUMBARE / THE SONG FROM KUMBARA
1955, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Radoš Novaković
ŠOLAJA
1955, Studio Film (Sarajevo), d. Vojislav Nanović
CEU eTD Collection
HANKA
1955, Bosna Film (Sarajevo)
d./e. Slavko Vorkapić, s. Isak Samokovlija, Slavko Vorkapić, c. Milenko Stojanović, m. Ilija
Marinković, pd./cd. Dragoljub Lazarević
cast: Vera Gregović, Jovan Milićević, Mira Stupica, Vaso Kosić, Mišo Mrvaljević, Jelena
Kešeljević, Kaja Ignjatović, Karlo Bulić, Milivoje Popović, Fran Novaković, Predrag Laković,
Aleksandar Stojković, Dejan Dubajić, Pavle Ković, Olga Nađ, Nada Urban, Jovan Jeremić, Mile
Pani, Esad Kazazović, Jovan Gec, Bogda Kazet, Dragutin Todić, Safet Pašalić
ts. standard, 3.600 m, black and white
PUTNICI SA SPLENDIDA / PASSENGERS FROM SPLENDID
1956, UFUS (Belgrade), d. Milenko Štrbac
KLISURA / DER FELSEN / THE ROCK
1956, Studio Film (Sarajevo), Titanus Film (West Germany), Projektograph Film (Austria), d. Boško
Kosanović
POTRAGA / THE SEARCH
1956, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Žorž Skrigin
239
OPSADA / THE SIEGE
1956, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Branko Marjanović
POSLEDNJI KOLOSEK / THE LAST TRACK
1956, UFUS (Belgrade)
d./s. Žika Mitrović, c. Dragoljub Karadžinović, m. Bojan Adamič, pd. Miomir Denić, cd. Danka
Pavlović, e. Vanja Bjenjaš
cast: Jovan Milićević, Marijan Lovrić, Olivera Marković, Salko Repak, Severin Bijelić, Dragomir
Bojanić Gidra, Irena Kolesar, Slobodan Perović, Žarko Mitrović, Vladimir Medar, Svetislav
Pavlović, Miodrag Veselinović, Sonja Hlebš, Milivoje Popović, Mirko Srećković, Desa Berić, Ivo
Jakšić, Bata Živojinović, Radmilo Ćurčić, ts. standard, 2.300 m, black and white
ZLE PARE / THE EVIL MONEY
1956, Lovćen Film (Budva), d. Velimir Stojanović
VELIKI I MALI / THE BIG AND THE SMALL
1956, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Vladimir Pogačić
CEU eTD Collection
POD SUMNJOM / UNDER SUSPICION
1956, Bosna Film (Sarajevo)
d./s. Branko Belan, c. Hrvoje Sarić, m. Silvije Bombardelli, pd. Strahinja Petrović, cd. Jagoda
Bujić–Bonetti, e. Blaženka Jenčik
cast: Milorad Margetić, Tamara Miletić, Mirko Vojković, Božo Jajčanin, Josip Zappalorto, Drago
Mitrović, Mile Gatara, Josip Vikario, Mišo Mrvaljević, Obrad Gluščević, Ivka Berković, Božo
Nardeli, Dejan Dubajić, Asja Kisić, Marija Aljinović, Bogdan Buljan, Toma Kuruzović, Branka
Krželj, Jakov Andrić, Dulka Bujas, Ljubo Milanović, Dragutin Jelić, Branko Belan, Pero Tedeski
ts. standard, 2.650 m, black and white
NE OKREĆI SE, SINE / DON’T TURN ROUND, SON
1956, Jadran Film (Zagreb)
d. Branko Bauer, s. Branko Bauer, Arsen Diklić, c. Branko Blažina, m. Bojan Adamič, pd. Želimir
Zagotta, e. Boris Tešija
cast: Bert Sotlar, Lila Andres, Zlatko Lukman, Mladen Hanzlovski, Radojko Ježić, Stjepan Jurčević,
Greta Kraus–Aranicki, Zlatko Madunić, Tihomir Polanec, Nikša Štefanini, Vladimir Bačić, Kolja
Carević, Vladimir Dopuđa, Nela Eržišnik, Viki Glovacki, Beba Lončar, Marija Merlić, Ivo Pajić,
Mladen Šerment, Branko Špoljar, Hrvoje Švob, Kruno Valentić
ts. standard, 3.031 m, black and white
DOLINA MIRU / DOLINA MIRA / THE VALLEY OF PEACE
1956, Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. France Štiglic
240
CIPELICE NA ASFALTU / THE CHILDREN’S SHOES ON ASPHALT
1956, Avala Film (Belgrade)
d. Boško Vučinić, Zdravko Randić, Ljubomir Radičević
U MREŽI / IN THE WEB
1956, Lovćen Film (Budva), d. Bojan Stupica
DALMATINSKA SVADBA / EINMAL KEHR’ ICH WEIDER
1957, Hansa film (West Germany), Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. Géza von Bolváry
KO PRIDE LJUBEZEN / QUAND VIENT L’AMOUR
1957, Production H. P. D. (France), Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. Maurice Cloche
ZENICA
1957, UFUS (Belgrade)
d. Jovan Živanović, Miloš Stefanović, s. Miloš Stefanović, Bogdan Jovanović, c. Josip Novak, m.
Bojan Adamič, pd. Dragoljub Lazarević, cd. Mira Glišić, e. Jelena Bjenjaš
cast: Rade Marković, Gordana Miletić, Mato Milošević, Stojan Aranđelović, Mihajlo Viktorović,
Nikola Popović, Svetlana Mišović, Dragoslav Popović, Viktor Starčić, Pavle Vuisić, Nikola Milić,
Vera Stefanović, Miloš Šami, Nada Zamfirović, Sveta Milutinović, Krsta Stojković, Žarko Velicki,
Nikola Gašić, Dragomir Bojanić Gidra, Milorad Samardžić, Milica Mijatović
ts. standard, 2.349 m, black and white
CEU eTD Collection
NIJE BILO UZALUD / IT WAS NOT IN VAIN
1957, Jadran Film (Zagreb)
d./s. Nikola Tanhofer, c. Slavko Zalar, m. Milo Cipra, pd. Zdravko Gmajner, cd. Olga Maruševski,
e. Radojka Tanhofer
cast: Boris Buzančić, Mira Nikolić, Zlata Perlić, Mia Oremović, Vjera Simić, Zvonimir Rogoz, Ivan
Šubić, Ljuba Tadić, Antun Vrdoljak, Marija Aleksić, Silva Fulgosi, Duka Tadić, Mladen Šerment,
Stjepan Jurčević, Branko Majer, Branko Šantić, Zvonimir Nuber
ts. standard, 2.662 m, black and white
TUĐA ZEMLJA / THE LAND OF THE OTHERS
1957, Bosna Film (Sarajevo)
d. Jože Gale, s. Meša Selimović, c. Ivan Marinček, m. Bojan Adamič, pd. Džemo Ćesović, e. Ruža
Cvingl
cast: Rade Marković, Ilija Džuvalekovski, Milorad Margetić, Tamara Miletić, Marija Crnobori,
Stane Potokar, Mihajlo Bata Paskaljević, Milutin Jasnić, Toma Kuruzović, Vlastimir Đuza
Stojiljković, Radovan Vučković, Dubravka Kenić
ts. standard, 2.440 m, black and white
241
MALE STVARI / THE LITTLE THINGS
1957, Studio Film (Sarajevo), d. Boško Kosanović
MALI ČOVEK / THE LITTLE MAN
1957, Vardar Film (Skopje), d. Živan Čukulić
POP ĆIRA I POP SPIRA / FATHER ĆIRA AND FATHER SPIRA
1957, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Soja Jovanović
SAMO LJUDI... / ONLY HUMAN
1957, Jadran Film (Zagreb)
d. Branko Bauer, s. Arsen Diklić, c. Branko Blažina, m. Bojan Adamič, pd. Vladimir Tadej, e.
Radojka Tanhofer
cast: Tamara Miletić, Milorad Margetić, Nikša Štefanini, Olivera Marković, Stjepan Jurčević, Nela
Eržišnik, Branko Šantić, Tomo Kuruzović, Luka Delić, Dragoslav Popović, Dušan Banjac, Darinka
Đurašević
ts. standard, 2.890 m, black and white
SVOGA TELA GOSPODAR / MASTER OF ONE’S OWN BODY
1957, Jadran Film (Zagreb)
d. Fedor Hanžeković, s. Slavko Kolar, c. Oktavijan Miletić, m. Fran Lhotka, pd. Želimir Zagotta, e.
Blaženka Jenčik
cast: Marija Kohn, Julije Perlaki, Mladen Šerment, Nela Eržišnik, Ivo Pajić, Vanja Timer, Marija
Aleksić, August Cilić, Viktor Bek, Ivka Dabetić, Ljubica Jović, Mate Ergović, Rikard Brzeska,
Fabijan Šovagović, Ivo Serdar
ts. standard, 2.977 m, black and white
CEU eTD Collection
NAŠI SE PUTOVI RAZILAZE / WE’RE GOING SEPARATE WAYS
1957, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Šime Šimatović
SUBOTOM UVEČE / SATURDAY EVENING
1957, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Vladimir Pogačić
NE ČAKAJ NA MAJ / DON’T WHISPER
1957, Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. František Čap
KRVAVA KOŠULJA / THE BLOODY SHIRT
1957, Lovćen Film (Budva), d. Žorž Skrigin
VRATIĆU SE / I WILL BE BACK
1957, Bosna Film (Sarajevo)
242
d. Jože Gale, s. Jara Ribnikar, Zoran Gluščević, c. Ivan Marinček, m. Marjan Kozina, pd. Vladimir
Tadej, e. Zora Branković
cast: Stevo Žigon, Irena Kolesar, Stane Sever, Mia Oremović, Vasa Pantelić, Dragoslav Popović,
Ilija Džuvalekovski, Mihajlo Bata Paskaljević, Severin Bijelić, Dragan Todić, Relja Bašić, Stjepan
Pisek, Ljudevit Gerovac, Tomo Kuruzović, Joviša Vojnović, Marija Tocinovski, Jelena Žigon, Boris
Smoje, Milorad Samardžić, Moris Levi, Josip Bilić, Rejhan Demirdžić, Jovan Rančić
ts. standard, 2.600 m, black and white
POTRAŽI VANDU KOS / LOOK FOR VANDA KOS
1957, Avala Film (Belgrade)
d. Žika Mitrović, s. Frida Filipović, c. Dragoljub Karadžinović, m. Dragutin Savin, pd. Milan Vasić,
e. Milica Poličević
cast: Olga Spiridonović, Zoran Ristanović, Jozo Laurenčić, Merima Eminović, Viktor Starčić,
Rahela Ferari, Nevenka Mikulić, Milan Srdoč, Žarko Mitrović, Branko Đorđević, Vladimir Medar,
Slobodan Stojanović
ts. standard, 1.960 m, black and white
VELIKI PLAVI PUT / LA GRANDE STRADA AZZURA / THE WIDE BLUE ROAD
1958, G. E. S. I. Cinematografica (Italy), Play Art (France), Eichberg Film (West Germany), Triglav
Film (Ljubljana), d. Gillo Pontecorvo
RAFAL U NEBO / SHOTS IN THE SKY
1958, UFUS (Belgrade), d. Vanja Bjenjaš
CRNI BISERI / THE BLACK PEARLS
1958, Bosna Film (Sarajevo), d. Toma Janić
CEU eTD Collection
DOBRO MORJE / THE GOOD SEA
1958, Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. Mirko Grobler
ALEKSA DUNDIĆ
1958, Avala Film (Belgrade), Kino-Studio Gorky (Soviet Union), d. Leonid Lukov
TRI KORAKA U PRAZNO / THREE STEPS INTO THE VOID
1958, Lovćen Film (Budva), d. Vojislav Nanović
KALA
1958, Viba Film (Ljubljana), d. Andrej Hieng, Krešo Golik
ČETIRI KILOMETRA NA SAT / FOUR KILOMETERS PER HOUR
1958, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Velimir Stojanović
243
CESTA DUGA GODINU DANA / THE YEAR LONG ROAD
1958, Jadran Film (Zagreb)
d. Giuseppe de Santis, s. Giuseppe de Santis, Maurizio Ferrara, Tonino Guerra, Elio Petri, Gianni
Puccini, Mario Socrate, c. Marco Scarpelli, m. Vladimir Kraus-Rajterić, pd. Želimir Zagotta, cd.
Jagoda Buić, e. Boris Tešija
cast: Silvana Pampanini, Eleonora Rossi Drago, Massimo Girotti, Bert Sotlar, Milivoje Živanović,
Gordana Miletić, Nikša Štefanini, Hermina Pipinić, Lia Rho–Barbieri, Antun Vrdoljak, Branko Tatić,
Nada Škrinjar, Radojko Ježić, Rikard Brzeska, Petar Spajić, Dragica Mežnarić, August Cilić,
Aleksandar Stojković, Neda Pataki, Milan Vojnović, Ljubo Dijan, Milan Lentić, Tihomir Polanec
ts. Ultrascope, 4.443 m, black and white
H-8...
1958, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Nikola Tanhofer
TE NOĆI / ON THAT NIGHT
1958, Slavija Film (Belgrade)
d. Jovan Živanović, s. Miroslav Subotički, c. Aleksandar Sekulović, m. Bojan Adamič, pd. Zoran
Zorčić, cd. Mira Glišić, e. Jelena Bjenjaš
cast: Rade Marković, Milanka Udovički, Jovan Milićević, Mihajlo Viktorović, Pavle Vuisić, Jovan
Janićijević, Daniel Obradović, Nikola Popović, Jovan Rančić, Mija Aleksić, Ljiljana Vajler, Dara
Čalenić, Nikola Milić, Severin Bijelić, Bata Živojinović, Milan Srdoč, Dragoslav Popović, Miodrag
Popović, Dragoslav Radoičić, Đokica Milaković, Predrag Milisavljević, Dušan Vuisić
ts. standard, 2.400 m, black and white
KROZ GRANJE NEBO / SS STRIKE AT DAWN
1958, UFUS (Belgrade), d. Stole Janković
CEU eTD Collection
JEDINI IZLAZ / THE ONLY WAY OUT
1958, Zastava film (Belgrade), d. Vicko Raspor, Aleksandar Petrović
MIS STON / MISS STONE
1958, Vardar Film (Skopje), d. Žika Mitrović
GOSPOĐA MINISTARKA / MRS. CABINET MINISTER
1958, UFUS (Belgrade), d. Žorž Skrigin
VELIKO PUTOVANJE / A GREAT JOURNEY
1958, Zora Film (Zagreb), d. Ivan Hetrich
POGON B / SECTION B
1958, UFUS (Belgrade)
244
d./s. Vojislav Nanović, c. Milorad Marković, Slobodan Novaković, m. Borivoje Simić, pd. Milan
Vasić, cd. Mira Glišić, e. Milanka Nanović
cast: Milivoje Živanović, Dragan Laković, Pavle Vuisić, Ljiljana Marković, Vasa Panetlić, Miroslav
Petrović, Nikola Popović, Branislav Jerinić, Slavko Simić, Stanko Buhanac, Miša Mirković,
Slobodan Simić, Ljubiša Jovanović, Marijan Lovrić, Desa Berić, Nada Škrinjar, Milan Ajvaz, Vuka
Kostić, Anka Vrbanić, Dragica Felba, Velimir Bošković, Vlasta Antonović, Milan Nešić
ts. standard, 2.600 m, black and white
KLEMPO
1958, Zora Film (Zagreb), d. Nikola Tanhofer
TAKVA PJESMA SVE OSVAJA / A SONG LIKE THAT WINS ALL
1958, Zora Film (Zagreb), d. Branko Majer
U NAŠEG MARINA / OUR GUY MARIN
1958, Zora Film (Zagreb), d. Branko Majer
ZVIJEZDA PUTUJE NA JUG ● HVEZDA JEDE NA JIH
1959, Barandov Film (Czechoslovakia), Lovćen Film (Budva), d. Oldřich Lipský
CEU eTD Collection
VRATA OSTAJU OTVORENA / THE DOORS REMAIN OPEN
1959, Bosna Film (Sarajevo)
d. František Čap, s. Vladimir Paskaljević, c. Janez Kališnik, m. Borut Lesjak, pd. Veselin Badrov,
cd. Helena Horvat, Ana Petrova, e. Manja Fuks
cast: Rade Vergović, Teodora Arsenović, Milena Dravić, Mirjana Erić, Zorica Lozić, Breda Dular,
Vera Hrkač, Snežana Misovska, Stanislava Lazarević, Dušan Janićijević, Miljko Jovanović, Radosav
Jukić, Dimitrije Nestorović, Dragan Zubac, Dušan Todorović, Fuad Ahmić, Nikola Barbalić, Branko
Pavlin, Luka Delić, Savo Jovanović, Boris Smoje, Mladen Nedeljković, Božica Kazazović
ts. standard, 2.747 m, black and white
SAM / ALONE
1959, Avala Film (Belgrade)
d./s. Vladimir Pogačić, c. Aleksandar Sekulović, m. Bojan Adamič, pd. Vlastimir Gavrik, e. Milada
Levi
cast: Nikola Simić, Milan Puzić, Pavle Vuisić, Severin Bijelić, Radmila Andrić, Tugomir Kostić,
Milorad Volić, Milan Srdoč, Franja Živni, Tori Janković, Ivan Jonaš, Milan Panić, Zoran
Marjanović, Đorđe Jelisić
ts. standard, 2.575 m, black and white
VLAK BEZ VOZNOG REDA / TRAIN WITHOUT A TIME TABLE
1959, Jadran Film (Zagreb)
245
d. Veljko Bulajić, s. Veljko Bulajić, Ivo Braut, Stjepan Perović, Elio Petri, c. Krešo Grčević, m.
Vladimir Kraus–Rajterić, pd. Dušan Jeričević, cd. Marko Cerovac, e. Blaženka Jenčik
cast: Olivera Marković, Lia Rho–Barbieri, Inge Ilin, Ljiljana Vajler, Ivica Pajer, Milan Milošević,
Stojan Aranđelović, Bata Živojinović, Jan Sid, Jelena Kešeljević, Ivona Petri, Tana Mascarelli, Luka
Delić, Mate Ergović, Krešimir Zidarić, Marko Soljačić, Ljubo Dijan, Muhamed Čejvan, Zdenka
Trach, Mirko Boman, Nevenka Benković, Milorad Spasojević, Zlatibor Stojmirov, Vera Simić
ts. totalvision, 3.308 m, black and white
VIZA NA ZLOTO / THE FALSE PASSPORT
1959, Vardar Film (Skopje), d. France Štiglic
OSMA VRATA / THE EIGHT DOORS
1959, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Nikola Tanhofer
DOBRI STARI PIANINO / THE GOOD OLD PIANO
1959, Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. France Kosmač
NOĆI I JUTRA / NIGHTS AND DAYS
1959, Bosna Film (Sarajevo), d. Pjer Majhrovski
TRI ČETRTINE SONCA ● THREE QUARTERS OF THE SUN
1959, Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. Jože Babič
CEU eTD Collection
PUKOTINA RAJA / HEAVEN WITHOUT LOVE
1959, Jadran Film (Zagreb)
d. Vladimir Pogačić, s. Milan Tutorov, V. Pogačić, c. Milorad Marković, Slobodan Marković, m.
Bojan Adamič, pd. Želimir Zagotta, e. Ljerka Stanojević
cast: Ljubica Jović, Milan Puzić, Severin Bijelić, Tatjana Beljakova, Antun Vrdoljak, Branko Tatić,
Branka Pantelić, Milivoj Popović, Milan Lentić, Zlatko Crnković, Zoran Longinović, Milan
Vojnović, Stanko Buhanac, Vlado Bačić, Rikard Brzeska
ts. standard, 2.911 m, black and white
PET MINUTA RAJA / FIVE MINUTES OF PARADISE
1959, Bosna Film (Sarajevo), d. Igor Pretnar
CAMPO MAMULA / CAMP MAMULA
1959, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Velimir Stojanović
VETAR JE STAO PRED ZORU / THE WIND STOPS BLOWING
1959, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Radoš Novaković
246
TRI ANE / THREE ANAS, OR THREE GIRLS NAMED ANA
1959, Vardar Film (Skopje)
d. Branko Bauer, s. Slobodan Glumac, c. Branko Blažina, m. Bojan Adamič, pd. Vladimir Tadej, cd.
Mira Glišić, e. Radojka Tanhofer
cast: Dušan Stefanović, Svetlana Mišković, Marija Kohn, Dubravka Gall, Branko Tatić, Ružica
Komnenović, Tito Strozzi, Vera Misita, Velimir Hitil, Marica Popović, Josip Marotti, Dubravka
Rajhl, Željko Šoš, Milivoje Popović, Dušan Janićijević, Marija Danira, Stanoje Dušanović, Stjepan
Jurčević, Vladimir Medar, Vera Orlović, Stjepan Draganić, Mladen Branđolica, Dušan Vuisić
ts. Totalscope, 2.654 m, black and white
BIJELI ĐAVO / AGI MURAD, IL DIAVOLO BIANCO / THE WHITE WARRIOR
1959, Lovćen Film (Budva), Majestic films (Italy), d. Riccardo Freda
JURNJAVA ZA MOTOROM / THE MOTORCYCLE CHASE
1959, Zora Film (Zagreb), d. Branko Majer
PIKO
1959, Zora Film (Zagreb), d. Srećko Weygand
KOTA 905 / POINT 905
1960, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Mate Relja
DILIŽANSA SNOVA / THE DREAMS CAME BY COACH
1960, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Soja Jovanović
CEU eTD Collection
DEVETI KRUG / THE NINTH CIRCLE
1960, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. France Štiglic
KAPETAN LEŠI / CAPTAIN LLESHI
1960, Slavija Film (Belgrade)
d./s. Žika Mitrović, c. Branko Ivatović, m. Rexho Muliqi, pd. Vlastimir Gavrik, cd. Božana
Jovanović, e. Vanja Bjenjaš
cast: Aleksandar Gavrić, Petar Prličko, Dimitar Kostarov, Reiner Penkert, Marija Tocinoski, Selma
Karlovac, Abdurrahman Shala, Siegfried Breuer Jd., Darko Damevski, Jovan Rančić, Dušan Tadić,
Dušan Antonijević, Pavle Vuisić, Boris Beginov, Shaban Gashi, Đorđe Nenadović, Shani Pallaska,
Istref Begolli, Muharrem Qena, Zlatibor Stoimirov, Pantelija Grnčarovski, Ranko Bradić
ts. Cinemascope, 2.953 m, colour
AKCIJA / ACTION
1960, Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. Jane Kavčič
247
IZGUBLJENA OLOVKA / THE LOST PENCIL
1960, Zora Film (Zagreb), d. Fedor Škubonja
DRUG PREDSEDNIK CENTARFOR
1960, UFUS (Belgrade), d. Žorž Skrigin
RAT / ATOMIC WAR BRIDE
1960, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Veljko Bulajić
X 25 JAVLJA / X 25 REPORTS
1960, Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. František Čap
PARTIZANSKE PRIČE / PARTISAN STORIES
1960, UFUS (Belgrade), d. Stole Janković
VESELICA / THE FEAST
1960, Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. Jože Babič
KAPÒ
1960, Vides, Zebra Films, Cineriz (Italy), Francinex (France), Lovćen Film (Budva), d. Gillo
Pontecorvo
LJUBAV I MODA / LOVE AND FASHION
1960, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Ljubomir Radičević
SIGNALI NAD GRADOM / SIGNALS ABOVE THE CITY
1960, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Žika Mitrović
CEU eTD Collection
ZAJEDNIČKI STAN / THE SHARED APARTMENT
1960, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Marijan Vajda
BOLJE JE UMETI... / IT IS BETTER TO KNOW HOW
1960, Avala Film (Belgrade)
d./s. Vojislav Nanović, c. Radoš Lužanin, m. Bojan Adamič, pd. Miodrag Nikolić, cd. Anđelka
Slijepčević, e. Milanka Nanović
cast: Pavle Vuisić, Milena Dravić, Dragan Laković, Mija Aleksić, Božidarka Frajt, Blaženka
Katalinić, Žarko Mitrović, Jelena Bjeličić, Pavle Minčić, Joviša Vojnović, Dušan Antonijević,
Stanko Buhanac, Zlatko Madunić, Dušan Dobrović, Milorad Nikolić, Mato Grković, Sabrija Biser,
Vaso Perišić, Pavle Bogatinčević, Desa Berić, Marko Milisavljević, Jovan Gec, Gabi Novak
ts. widescreen, 2.855 m, colour
248
DAN ČETRNAESTI / THE DAY FOURTEEN
1960, Lovćen Film (Budva), d. Zdravko Velimirović
PARČE PLAVOG NEBA / A PIECE OF THE BLUE SKY
1961, Bosna Film (Sarajevo), d. Toma Janić
PRVI GRAĐANIN MALE VAROŠI / THE FIRST CITIZEN OF THE SMALL TOWN
1961, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Puriša Đorđević
TI LOVIŠ / HIDE AND SEEK
1961, Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. France Kosmač
MARTIN U OBLACIMA / MARTIN IN THE CLOUDS
1961, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Branko Bauer
KAROLINA RIJEČKA / KAROLINA OF RIJEKA
1961, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Vladimir Pogačić
NEMA MALIH BOGOVA / THERE ARE NO LESSER GODS
1961, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Radivoje Lola Đukić
NEBESKI ODRED / THE SUICIDE SQUAD
1961, Lovćen Film (Budva), d. Boško Bošković, Ilija Nikolić
CEU eTD Collection
MIRNO LETO / THE SERENE SUMMER
1961, Vardar Film (Skopje), d. Dimitrie Osmanli
PLES V DEŽJU / A DANCE IN THE RAIN
1961, Triglav Film (Ljubljana)
d./s. Boštjan Hladnik, c. Janez Kališnik, m. Bojan Adamič, pd. Niko Matul, cd. Nada Souvan, e.
Kleopatra Harisijades
cast: Duša Počkaj, Miha Baloh, Rado Nakrst, Ali Raner, Joža Zupan, Arnold Tovornik, Janez
Jerman, Janez Albreht, Vida Juvan, Demeter Bitenc, Janko Hočevar, Franci Jež, Mojca Platner, Miha
Burger
ts. widescreen, 2.680 m, black and white
CAREVO NOVO RUHO / THE EMPEROR’S NEW CLOTHES
1961, Zora Film (Zagreb), d. Ante Babaja
NOČNI IZLET / NIGHT TRIP
1961, Viba Film (Ljubljana), d. Mirko Grobler
249
PUSTOLOV PRED VRATIMA / THE ADVENTURER ON THE DOORS
1961, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Šime Šimatović
BALADA O TROBENTI IN OBLAKU / THE BALLAD OF THE TRUMPET AND THE CLOUD
1961, Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. France Štiglic
SREĆA DOLAZI U DEVET / LUCK COMES AT 9
1961, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Nikola Tanhofer
SUDAR NA PARALELAMA / CRASH ON THE TRAIN
1961, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Jože Babič
SOLUNSKITE ATENTATORI / THE ASSASINS FROM SALONIKA
1961, Vardar Film (Skopje), d. Žika Mitrović
UZAVRELI GRAD / BOOM TOWN
1961, Avala Film (Belgrade)
d. Veljko Bulajić, s. Dragoslav Ilić, Radenko Ostojić, Bruno Barati, Veljko Bulajić, c. Krešo
Grčević, m. Vladimir Kraus–Rajterić, pd. Duško Jeričević, cd. Maja Galasso, e. Ljerka Stanojević
cast: Ilija Džuvalekovski, Bata Živojinović, Dragomir Felba, Janez Vrhovec, Miloš Kandić, Nikola
Privora, Zaim Muzaferija, Olivera Marković, Milena Dravić, Lia Rho Barbieri, Mira Sardoč, Lela
Šimecki, Zorica Šimunović, Tana Mascarelli, Ivan Radonić, Danijel Obradović, Latica Ivanišević
ts. Cinemascope, 3.128 m, black and white
NASILJE NA TRGU / SQUARE OF VIOLENCE
1961, Lovćen Film (Budva), d. Leonardo Bercovici
CEU eTD Collection
NE UBIJ / TU NE TUERAS POINT / THOU SHALT NOT KILL
1961, Lovćen Film (Budva), Gold Film (Italy), Vaduz Film (Lichtenstein), d. Claude Autant–Lara
DVOJE / AND LOVE HAS VANISHED
1961, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Aleksandar Petrović
PESMA / THE SONG
1961, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Radoš Novaković
NE DIRAJ U SREĆU / DON’T MESS WITH HAPPINESS
1961, Lovćen Film (Budva), d. Milo Đukanović
DRUŽINSKI DNEVNIK / FAMILY DIARY
1961, Viba Film (Ljubljana), d. Jože Gale
250
SREĆA U TORBI / THE BAG OF LUCK
1961, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Radivoje Lola Đukić
IZBIRAČICA / PICKY GIRL
1961, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Marijan Vajda, Dimitrije Đurković
VELIKA TURNEJA / THE GRAND TOUR
1961, Bosna Film (Sarajevo), d. Žorž Skrigin
POTRAGA ZA ZMAJEM / SEARCH FOR THE KITE
1961, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Jane Kavčič
ABECEDA STRAHA / THE ALPHABET OF FEAR
1961, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Fadil Hadžić
VELIKO SUĐENJE / THE BIG TRIAL
1961, Zora Film (Zagreb), d. Fedor Škubonja
LETO JE KRIVO ZA SVE / BLAME IT ON THE SUMMER
1961, UFUS (Belgrade), d. Puriša Đorđević
IGRE NA SKELAMA / PLAYING ON THE SCAFFOLDING
1961, Zora Film (Zagreb), d. Srećko Weygand
STEPENICE HRABROSTI / THE STAIRWAY FOR THE COURAGEOUS
1961, Zastava Film (Belgrade), d. Oto Deneš
CEU eTD Collection
SIBIRSKA LEDI MAGBET / SIBERIAN LADY MACBETH
1962, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Andrzej Wajda
PROZVAN JE I V-3 / THE LAST ROLL-CALL
1962, UFUS (Belgrade), d. Milan Štrbac
PREKOBROJNA / THE SUPERFLUOUS ONE
1962, Avala Film (Belgrade)
d. Branko Bauer, s. Bogdan Jovanović, Krešo Golik, Branko Bauer, c. Branko Blažina, m. Vladimir
Kraus-Rajterić, pd. Branko Hundić, cd. Branka Soldo, e. Blaženka Jenčik
cast: Milena Dravić, Ljubiša Samardžić, Boris Dvornik, Dragomir Felba, Jovan Rančić, Molotov
Jovanović, Snežana Mihajlović, Snežana Mladenović, Đorđe Nenadović, Slavomir Stojković,
Dragana Nikolić, Miodrag Popović, Ivan Jagodić, Ruža Vesligaj, Strahinja Mojić, Aleksandar Mitić,
Zvezdana Đorđević, Dobrila Kekić
ts. Cinemascope, 2.569 m, black and white
251
SREŠĆEMO SE VEČERAS / WE WILL MEET TONIGHT
1962, Bosna Film (Sarajevo), d. František Čap
ČUDNA DEVOJKA / STRANGE GIRL
1962, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Jovan Živanović
MEDALJON SA TRI SRCA / MEDALLION WITH THREE HEARTS
1962, UFUS (Belgrade), d. Vladan Slijepčević
ŠEKI SNIMA, PAZI SE! / ŠEKI IS SHOOTING – BEWARE!
1962, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Marijan Vajda
DR. / D.PHIL.
1962, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Soja Jovanović
SJENKA SLAVE / SHADOW OF FAME
1962, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Vanja Bjenjaš
ZVIŽDUK U OSAM / WHISTLE AT 8 P.M.
1962, UFUS (Belgrade), d. Sava Mrmak
DA LI JE UMRO DOBAR ČOVJEK? / DID A GOOD MAN DIE?
1962, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Fadil Hadžić
KRST RAKOC
1962, Bosna Film (Sarajevo), d. Žika Ristić
CEU eTD Collection
MINUTA ZA UMOR / A MINUTE FOR MURDER
1962, Viba Film (Ljubljana), d. Jane Kavčič
SAŠA
1962, Avala Film (Belgrade), d. Radenko Ostojić
KAPI, VODE, RATNICI / DROPS, WATERS, WARRIORS
1962, Sutjeska Film (Sarajevo), d. Živojin Pavlović, Marko Babac, Kokan Rakonjac
KOZARA
1962, Bosna Film (Sarajevo), d. Veljko Bulajić
TISTEGA LEPEGA DNE / THAT BEAUTIFUL DAY
1962, Viba Film (Ljubljana), d. France Štiglic
252
OBRAČUN / SHOWDOWN
1962, Avala Film (Belgrade)
d./s. Žika Mitrović, c. Ljube Petkovski, m. Rexho Muliqi, pd. Dime Šumka, cd. e. Katarina
Stojanović
cast: Aleksandar Gavrić, Jelena Žigon, Petre Prličko, Ilija Milčin, Abdurrahman Shala, Gojko
Kovačević, Dragan Ocokoljić, Todor Nikolovski, Darko Damevski, Panče Vasovski Kamšik, Vukan
Dimevski, Svetislav Pavlović, Mira Oljenji, Žarko Kojčev, Risto Strezov, Pantelija Grnčarovski,
Pantelej Mirkov, Muharrem Shahiqi, Fehmi Grubi, Džemail Maksut, Ramadan Jonuz
ts. Totalscope, 2.316 m, colour
RANA JESEN / EARLY AUTUMN
1962, Jadran Film (Zagreb), d. Toma Janić
MAČAK POD ŠLJEMOM / CAT UNDER THE HELMET
1962, Bosna Film (Sarajevo), d. Žorž Skrigin
NAŠ AVTO / OUR CAR
1962, Triglav Film (Ljubljana), d. František Čap
CEU eTD Collection
PEŠČENI GRAD / THE SAND CASTLE
1962, Production Group Reflex, Viba Film (Ljubljana), d. Boštjan Hladnik
253
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